Wednesday's final training camp practice came and went with Buffalo's starting quarterback under center. The deep thigh bruise suffered by Trent Edwards in practice Tuesday night had the signal caller stiff and watching practice as he was limping a bit Wednesday.
"I wish I could be out there with the guys, but it's part of the sport," said Edwards. "You get hurt. You just don't want to be selfish to the point where you're going to get back out there and re-injure yourself and not be able to play at your level throughout the season. So you've got to be conscious of that and make sure that your team realizes that you want to get back out there as soon as possible to help this team win. It's disappointing, but I'm glad it happened during the preseason instead of the regular season."
Edwards described what happened on the running play when he tried to hand the ball off to Marshawn Lynch.
"Marshawn was a little bit tight on a running play and I was a little bit wide and we kind of collided," Edwards said. "It was scary. It felt like Marshawn had almost kicked me. I know it's not physically possible for a running back to kick me right in the leg. I had my knee pads on and everything and for some reason it missed the pad and I guess Marshawn's knee collided with mine. That hasn't happened to me before in my football career, but hopefully it won't happen again."
The quarterback and his head coach do not consider the injury a setback as the results of the injury are still unfolding.
"We're just kind of going day by day and we'll see how he is," said Dick Jauron. "He's better today than he was last night. Those things can pass relatively quickly or they can linger for a good while because it's a significant bruise. We'll just have to go daily and see how he is."
Edwards says ultimately it will come down to how much they can control the swelling and get it to subside.
"That's going to kind of tell where I'm at with my progress is the amount of swelling that is in there and how quickly we can get it out of there so I can get back on the field," he said.
What the main concern is for Edwards with respect to playing is having the power to drive off his right leg when throwing a pass. With the bruise just above his knee he needs to have strength in his back leg to get power behind his throws.
"I'm hoping once I get back to working through the drops that it won't linger and won't be too bad," Edwards said. "But that's my main concern right now is pushing off that leg and when the swelling is out hopefully my strength will still be there."
As for Sunday's preseason game both Edwards and Jauron felt projecting that far was premature. It's clear that Buffalo's head coach simply will not play his starting quarterback if he's not completely healthy. However, knowing the third preseason game is usually the one in which the starters play the most Jauron didn't deny that in a perfect world he'd like to have him for the game.
"If you had your druthers you would have him play in the game, so hopefully he can play," said Jauron.
For now though Edwards is just focused on reducing the swelling and doing what he has to with the trainers to get his right leg healthy again.
"I haven't even thought that far ahead," said Edwards of the next preseason game. "Sunday is still a long way away and we still have three or four more practices until that game day. So I'm hoping to rehab it with the trainers as quickly as I can and help the team win."
