JERSEY CITY, N.J. — Place-kicker Matt Prater is coming around.
“Hopefully, in another day or two, I’ll be back to normal,” Prater said Sunday in the lobby of the Hyatt, the Broncos’ hotel for Super Bowl week.
Prater will be at practice Monday at New York Jets headquarters in Flor ham Park, N.J., and kick for the first time since the Broncos beat the New England Patriots 26-16 in the AFC championship game.
Last week, the Broncos didn’t practice Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. Prater was too ill to practice with the team Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
“I got some kind of flu or something,” Prater said. “It started to come on Tuesday night. When I woke up Wednesday morning, I felt like I got run over by a truck.”
Including the playoffs, Prater has made 30 of his 32 field-goal attempts (93.8 percent) this season and produced 93 touchbacks on 124 kickoffs (75 percent).
Practice preference. Coach John Fox would prefer to have the Broncos practice outdoors on grass fields this week. But the grass fields at Jets headquarters in Florham Park were covered by snow over the weekend.
So the Broncos will practice on the Jets’ artificial-turf practice field outdoors, or they will practice at the Jets’ indoor facility.
The forecast for Super Bowl Sunday in East Rutherford has improved to a high of 37 degrees with a 30 percent chance of rain mixed with snow.
“I heard it’s a phenomenal facility and, really, until we look at the fields, test the fields — we brought our grounds people,” Fox said. “I’d prefer grass. It saves our players’ legs.”
Footnotes. The Broncos will take their Super Bowl team picture Monday. … Players and coaches are on their own until Thursday, when they’re joined by their wives and family members.