Former TCU receiver Jeremy Kerley feeling at home in San Francisco

Jeremy Kerley hadn’t even had breakfast on Aug. 28 when his phone rang, changing everything. The first thing the former TCU star did when he found out the Detroit Lions had traded him was go online to research the San Francisco 49ers.

“I didn’t know a lot about the 49ers, so I didn’t know what I was walking into,” Kerley said. “It hit me as a surprise. I checked out who the coaches were, checked out who the players were, and four hours later, I was in San Jose.”

Kerley is wearing his third jersey in less than a year. After five years with the New York Jets, he spent five months in Detroit and has called the Bay Area home for only a month.

But Kerley is happy to be here after last season when he played the second-fewest snaps among the seven receivers on the Jets’ roster. His 223 snaps were only 20.1 percent of the team’s as new coach Todd Bowles phased Kerley out of the offense.

“I think for the most part they already had an idea of what type of receiver they were looking for, and it just wasn’t me,” Kerley said. “It was what it was. Decisions had to be made. I took it for what it was. I had loyalty for some of my teammates. I had loyalty for the fans, so I wasn’t going to just turn my back and shut them down. It’s kind of how it was.”

Kerley had only 16 catches for 152 yards last season. He already has 12 for 114 in three games this season in Chip Kelly’s offense.

“I was always loved [in New York]. I won’t say wanted, but I was always loved,” Kerley said. “I was loved by the fans in New York. I was loved by the players. Maybe not all the coaches.

“It just feels good to be playing football again. I felt like I didn’t play last year. … It feels good to be part of something.”

Purple People Eaters

The Purple People Eaters are back in a big way.

The Minnesota Vikings had eight sacks of Cam Newton last week, and they intercepted the reigning league MVP three times.

“We felt like coming into the game, we had pretty good chances to get to him,” Vikings defensive lineman Brian Robison, a UT alum, said in a phone interview. “But we had to stop the run first. If we were able to stop the run and put them in situations where they had to throw the ball, then we’d be able to get after them a little bit. As the game went along and we were able to stop the run, we were starting to figure some things out of how to get to him. That’s just what we were able to do.”

The Vikings, with former Dallas Cowboys defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer as their head coach, rank among the NFC favorites for the Super Bowl with an impressive 3-0 start. No one saw that coming after the Vikings lost their starting quarterback, Teddy Bridgewater, and star running back, Adrian Peterson, to major knee injuries.

“Obviously anytime you’ve got a guy that goes down, especially your starting quarterback, it comes as a big shock,” Robison said. “But the thing about this team is no matter what happens, we step up, and we put it on our shoulders and say, ‘OK, we’ve just got to step up and get the job done.’ As a defense, we put it on our shoulders. The offense has done the same thing. That’s the thing I love about this team: No matter what type of adversity we have faced, we’re going to keep moving forward and we’re going to keep pushing to get where we want to be.”

Kansas City Chiefs cornerback Marcus Peters, the 2015 defensive rookie of the year, has four interceptions this season. Over 21 regular and postseason games, Peters has 13 picks.

The Philadelphia Eagles signed linebacker Mychal Kendricks to a four-year, $29 million contract extension before last season, with nearly $12 million guaranteed. Kendricks, though, had the worst season of his career in 2015 and has been phased out this season with the new coaching staff. He played only nine defensive snaps last week.

100 Sacks taken by Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck in his first three seasons. Peyton Manning was sacked 56 times in his first three seasons in Indianapolis.

Dane Brugler of CBS Sports and NFLDraftScout.com gives his top-five senior running backs and top-10 draft-eligible underclassmen at the position for the 2017 draft:

Top-five senior RBs

3. Justin Davis, USC (6-1, 200, 4.53)

5. Donnel Pumphrey, SD St. (5-8, 180, 4.43)

Draft-eligible underclassmen

1. Dalvin Cook, Fla St. (5-11, 213, 4.46)

3. Christian McCaffrey, Stanford (6-0, 205, 4.48)

4. Joe Mixon, OU (6-1, 217, 4.52)

5. Nick Chubb, Ga. (5-10, 220, 4.54)

7. Samaje Perine, OU (5-10, 235, 4.57)

9. Elijah Hood, NC (5-11, 220, 4.59)

10. Jalen Hurd, Tenn. (6-3, 230, 4.57)

Blitz

Former TCU star Trevone Boykin made his regular-season debut last week in Seattle. He completed 7 of 9 passes for 65 yards with a touchdown and an interception in relief of Russell Wilson. One note of congratulations came from the father of Abby Faber, the 7-year-old with cerebral palsy who met Boykin for the coin toss at last year’s TCU game in Ames, Iowa. She and her family have been Boykin fans ever since.

Former A&M offensive lineman Germain Ifedi is expected to make his NFL debut this week. The Seahawks’ first-round pick missed the first three games with a high-ankle sprain.

Denver Broncos outside linebacker Von Miller, a former DeSoto and A&M star, leads the NFL with five sacks.

Former Texas star Marquise Goodwin has scored only four touchdowns in his NFL career for the Buffalo Bills, but the average length of the scores is 56.5 yards.

Colts running back Frank Gore needs 88 yards to pass Jim Brown (12,312) for ninth place on the NFL’s all-time rushing list.

San Diego Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers has no interceptions. Stan Humphries, in the team’s Super Bowl season of 1994, was the team’s last quarterback to open the season without an interception through 12 quarters.

Arizona Cardinals receiver Larry Fitzgerald has 16 career touchdowns against the Rams, the most against any single opponent by any active NFL player.

Rams defensive end Robert Quinn has 18 forced fumbles since the start of the 2012 season, the most in the NFL in that time.

Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford needs 104 yards passing to eclipse Dan Marino (27,064) for most passing yards by a player in his first 100 career games. The former Highland Park star, who is third in the NFL with 985 yards passing this year, has played 96 games.

Information from The Sports Xchange was used in this report.

1 The Washington Redskins officially have concern about first-round pick Josh Doctson. The former Mansfield Legacy and TCU star was a late scratch last week after feeling discomfort in his left foot. Redskins coach Jay Gruden said Doctson, who has one catch for 57 yards, might have to sit a couple of weeks because of tendinitis in his left Achilles. Doctson has practiced little since injuring his foot May 25.

2 The Baltimore Ravens have only four touchdowns this season, so it’s a good thing they have former UT standout Justin Tucker as their kicker. Tucker, who signed a four-year, $16.8 million deal in the off-season, made field goals of 43, 42, 37 and 54 last week and is 9 for 9 this season.

3 The Tampa Bay Bucs have struggled against young quarterbacks. Since the start of the 2012 season, they are 0-6 against quarterbacks with five or fewer career starts. No other NFL team has more than three such losses. Tampa Bay lost to Marcus Mariota, Teddy Bridgewater, Austin Davis, Geno Smith, Nick Foles and Robert Griffin early in their careers. This week they play Denver and Trevor Siemian, who has three career starts.

4 The Jets released cornerback Dee Milliner, who played in 21 of a possible 48 games since he was the ninth overall pick in 2013. Milliner, whose $2.1 million salary for this season is fully guaranteed, has had seven known surgeries since his college days at Alabama.

5 Drew Brees returns to San Diego for the first time since the Chargers let him walk after the 2005 season. In 11 seasons in New Orleans, Brees has a 94-67 record, a Super Bowl MVP, 356 passing touchdowns and 49,617 yards.

This story was originally published October 1, 2016 at 1:22 PM with the headline "Former TCU receiver Jeremy Kerley feeling at home in San Francisco."