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Bucs-Dolphins game moved to November

The Associated Press
September 7, 2017 at 1:06AM

The NFL announced Wednesday that the regular season opener between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Miami Dolphins on Sunday was postponed, pushed to the Week 11 bye week that both teams share because of the impending arrival of Hurricane Irma in South Florida.

The NFL chose to move the date of the game rather than relocate the teams to a neutral site. Among the locales considered were Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.

The game will be played at Miami's Hard Rock Stadium on Nov. 19. By moving it to the teams' shared bye week, both teams will now have to play 16 straight weeks to end the season. The Dolphins will have a particularly strenuous schedule to start the season and won't return home until Week 5.

With the schedule change, Tampa Bay will now play three of its first four games at home, starting Sept. 17 against the Bears.

One other takeaway for the Bucs is that Doug Martin, the team's starting running back who is suspended for the first three games of the season over a violation of the NFL's performance-enhancing substance policy, will now make his debut Oct. 5 against the Patriots instead of a week earlier.

The NFL had announced Tuesday that, after consulting with state and local officials as well as with both teams, the game would not be played in South Florida "in the interest of public safety in light of the continuing state of emergency."

Seahawk says police roughed him up

Seahawks defensive lineman Michael Bennett wrote via Twitter that he was the victim of excessive force from Las Vegas police while attending the Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor fight Aug. 26, saying he was held at gunpoint and assaulted while on the ground.

Bennett retained Oakland civil-rights attorney John Burris and is considering legal options, including filing a federal civil-rights lawsuit.

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A news release stated that "Bennett had been walking to his hotel when he heard gunfire, and when he ran for safety he was assaulted by two officers, one of whom held a gun to his head and another jammed his knee into Bennett's back so hard it was difficult for him to breathe."

Bennett wrote on Twitter that it was only after he was recognized that he was released "without any legitimate justification for the Officers' abusive conduct."

Etc.

• Bills starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor was cleared from concussion protocol and will start in Week 1.

• No. 2 overall draft pick Mitchell Trubisky will open the season as the Bears' No. 2 quarterback. Trubisky will back up Mike Glennon when the Bears host the defending NFC champion Falcons on Sunday.

• Giants star receiver Odell Beckham Jr. is back on the field and stretching with his teammates for the first time since injuring an ankle more than two weeks ago.

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In this photo taken Monday, March 6, 2017, in San Francisco, released confidential files by The University of California of a sexual misconduct case, like this one against UC Santa Cruz Latin Studies professor Hector Perla is shown. Perla was accused of raping a student during a wine-tasting outing in June 2015. Some of the files are so heavily redacted that on many pages no words are visible. Perla is one of 113 UC employees found to have violated the system's sexual misconduct policies in rece

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