1. Frank Gore to participate in Thursday's practice
There was encouraging news concerning veteran RB Frank Gore. Placed on the non-football injury list earlier in the week, Gore was fit and ready to participate in the team's first training camp practice Thursday.
"He's coming off of the NFI list," said GM Brandon Beane. "He passed his physical this morning, so he will be out on the practice field ready to roll."
The news concerning TE Tyler Kroft is a bit different. Kroft, who broke his foot in the spring which required surgery, was placed on the active physically unable to perform list earlier this week.
"He's basically just out right now," said head coach Sean McDermott. "He's making progress. He's done a great job this offseason getting himself to where he is right now."
2. Cole Beasley and others with spring injuries to be monitored
There were a host of players with injuries in the spring that kept them off the practice field during OTAs and minicamp. Chief among them was Cole Beasley, who underwent core muscle surgery in May.
The plan for him and many others who were sidelined is to participate in practice here at camp, but to be closely watched by the team's athletic training staff.
"We will monitor (Cole) as well as some of the other players who are coming off of injury in the spring," said McDermott. "There are a few of those guys. We'll monitor him at this point and see how he progresses through the first couple of days and then go from there. Overall it'll be a one practice at a time type of deal."
3. How the Rafael Bush retirement, Kurt Coleman signing unfolded
There was an unexpected retirement by Bills veteran S Rafael Bush this past week, and the club pivoted extremely well signing free agent S Kurt Coleman.
GM Brandon Beane shed some light on how those two related events came to happen last week.
"Rafael let us know in the middle of the summer that he was considering (retirement)," said Beane. "Sean and I had several conversations with him in going through that process. You don't want to talk people out of retiring, so we worked through it and gave him and his family time to make his decision.
"At the same time we were talking to Kurt, telling him if this happened we would make this move (sign him). So we told Rafael that we needed to know by a certain date and we wish him the best. Not everybody knows when their time is and I think he knew he was done with football."
Both Beane and McDermott are wholly familiar with Coleman's skill set and character. McDermott, while serving as a coach on Andy Reid's staff in Philadelphia, actually recommended that the Eagles draft Coleman in 2010 when asked by Reid what DBs he liked late in the draft that year.
In the 2015 offseason, McDermott was the primary recruiter to get then free agent Kurt Coleman to sign with the Panthers. All Coleman did after signing was post career highs almost across the board in helping Carolina reach the Super Bowl that year.
"Kurt is a guy who is familiar with both of us," said Beane. "We brought him in to Carolina in 2015 and he had a career year and was a big part of our defense and the full success we had in Carolina that year. He had seven picks and two more in the playoffs that season.
"He's started more than 80 games so he'll bring a lot of veteran savvy. He's a hard-nosed player who is very smart and a great fit for our team and this defense."
