The COVID-19 reserve list was almost completely empty three days ago. According to Jason Owens on Yahoo.com, there was just one player left on the list. It was almost eradicated from the NFL before the regular season even started.

Everyone was getting excited. It looked like all the safety measurements that were put into place were working to perfection. There were no new cases in a while and the NFL regular season was fast approaching.

Field Yates of ESPN took to Twitter with some discouraging NFL news on that front. There have been two more players added to that list.

Carolina Panthers defensive back Derek Thomas and New Orleans Saints running back Dwayne Washington are now on the NFL COVID/reserve list.

Yates does not have any added information on the two players. It does not say if they just tested positive or if they are already a few days into the virus. That is very important because the regular season is fast approaching.

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We are just two weeks away from the regular season. So the players need every second of that time to try and clear the list so they could be available for Week 1.

Another aspect of this that we have to wonder about is the rest of the two teams. NFL training camps have been going on for a few weeks now. That means that the players have all been together.

So the question here is, will either of these positive cases lead to outbreaks on the teams? Or have they already been tested and cleared?

At the moment, that is not clear. What we do know though, is that Thomas and Washington are likely going to be out of action for the next few weeks. Hopefully they can return to action without missing too much of the regular season.

It's important to remember that while this is a little discouraging and a small step backwards, it is not the end of the season. There are still just four names on the list and hopefully that number remains low.