BEREA, Ohio — Browns kicker Dustin Hopkins will miss Thursday night’s game against the Jets, head coach Kevin Stefanski announced on Tuesday, and will be week-to-week with a left hamstring injury. The Browns signed Riley Patterson to the practice squad Monday.
As far as the punting situation, Stefanski would only say, “We’ll see. Not sure yet,” when asked if Corey Bojorquez, who injured his left kicking leg on a kickoff in place of Hopkins on Sunday, will play against the Jets.
The Browns signed punter Matt Haack to the practice squad on Tuesday.
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Hopkins injured the hamstring chasing Texans running back Dameon Pierce on a 98-yard kickoff return touchdown against the Texans.
“It’s hard to turn effort off sometimes,” Hopkins said after the game on Sunday. “If I’m in the game, I’m going to try my best, whatever play I’m doing and, shoot, hopefully I can instill that in my son. But in this instance, maybe I should have shut it down five yards earlier or something when I knew he had the angle on me.”
The Browns chose not to attempt any field goals or extra points after Hopkins’ injury and safety D’Anthony Bell handled kickoff duties after Bojorquez went down. Most notably, with five seconds remaining in the first half, Stefanski chose to allow Flacco to throw into the end zone instead of attempting a 36-yard field goal.
“I didn’t want to put those guys in a tough spot, even where we were,” Stefanski said. “I know it’s a shorter field goal, but the operation, you could get it blocked, I just didn’t feel like that was the right thing to do.”
Hopkins has made 33 of 36 field goal attempts this season, including all eight of his attempts from 50 yards or more. He is 24 of 26 on extra point attempts.
The Browns acquired Hopkins in a trade the day before roster cutdowns after deciding to move on from Cade York. Hopkins lost a kicking battle to Cameron Dicker with the Chargers.
Patterson, in his third season out of Memphis, originally signed with the Vikings as an undrafted free agent in 2021. In 37 games with the Lions and Jaguars, he’s made 58 of 66 field goals and 87 of 90 extra points. He’s 3 of 6 in his career from 50 yards or more.
“Just the experience, period, is important when it comes to a kicker in this situation,” Stefanski said, “but a guy that I think had a good workout, has good tape. Believe in him.”
Patterson was in his second stint with the Lions this season before they cut him a week ago. The Lions benched him for their Week 15 game against Denver after he missed extra points in losses to Chicago in Week 14 and Green Bay in Week 12.
Haack is in his seventh NFL season out of Arizona State. Originally signed by Miami as an undrafted free agent in 2017, he has appeared in 98 career games with the Dolphins (2017-20), Bills (2021) and Colts (2022). He has punted 429 times in his career and averages 44.5 yards per punt, with 160 landing inside the 20.
Stefanski said whoever the punter is on Thursday night, Bojorquez or Haack, will handle holding duties.
Stefanski said the team’s specialists were working at Cleveland Browns Stadium on Tuesday.
It will be a quite a welcome to Cleveland for the new guys, playing a night game with a rabid fan base ready to see their team clinch its first playoff berth since 2020 with a victory over the Jets. The temperature Thursday night is expected to be in the low 40s with a chance of rain.
“We feel good about our plan,” Stefanski said. “We know we’ll have a kicker and a punter that we feel good about. We know that.”
