Head coach Mike Smith gave injury updates on Michael Jenkins, Erik Coleman and Sean Weatherspoon during his post-practice interview with the Atlanta media Thursday.
On how practice went and the decision to move it indoors:
"It was pouring down rain when we started practice today so we looked at the radar and our weather guy told us that it was going to rain all day. That wasn't right but part of our practice would have been in the rain. It was raining really hard when we were getting ready to get started so that's why we brought it inside."
On how close WR Michael Jenkins is to playing:
"We would like to get him back as quick as possible. Again, it's going to be him being cleared by the doctors. He is participating in practice again this week and the participation is much more than he did last week. He will get evaluated here at end of the week and we will make a decision as we get closer to game time. He has ramped up his reps this week."
On LB Sean Weatherspoon's status:
"He did not practice again today, he was out. He still has an issue with his ankle. We will try again tomorrow. He worked with our Athletic Performance people and we'll see how he's feeling. Again, that's something that flared up after the game and we will re-evaluate him on Friday. He'll try to do some things there on the side and hopefully get out and get a few reps so we can get him ready for the game."
On how S Erik Coleman is coming along:
"It was good to see Erik being able to come back and participate two days in a row. It was a little bit more limited in terms of snaps because we were here on the turf. We want to make sure that we're not going to overload that knee. Erik's done a wonderful job with the people in the training room to get back from that MCL injury. Again, to see how he goes through three days of work, but he's working hard."
On how the conditioning and Athletic Performance played a role on the last drive in New Orleans:
"I think that we've got a very fit football team. When you look at our team when we come out for warm-ups they look very fit. There's not a whole lot of obese looking guys. They look athletic and that's something that we start evaluating when we start our draft process. We want to have guys that are physically fit and I think the guys understand what we're trying to do in the weight room. It's really based on building the core strength, we're not necessarily concerned with how much we can bench press and how much we can squat. It's really about the core and then the other thing that we're concerned about is making sure that we have balance from one side to the other. We don't want to be right-side dominant or left-side dominant. We want to make sure that we have good balance between both sides of our body."
On whether that is a trend he has noticed throughout the league:
"There's probably two or three main philosophies in terms of weight training, at least here in the NFL. I think that the strength coaches or the guys that are working with Athletic Performance are usually in one of those three categories. We've been very pleased with what we've been able to accomplish in our offseason and again with our maintenance programs during the season."
On having the former Falcons Pro Bowlers at the game on Sunday:
"Alumni Weekend is a great weekend for the Atlanta Falcon organization. We have an Alumni Day where we invite our former players back during training camp and we got an opportunity to sit and visit with them between practices. When we have alumni and we're in our throwback jerseys and you're bringing back all the Pro Bowl players, there's going to be some really fine football players that are recognized there at halftime. I know that it's just not there at the game from what I understand; they've got activities planned throughout the weekend. I think it's a great thing for our organization and I think that the alumni are very important, former players that still have an interest in our organization and our team."
