Wide receiver D’Wayne Eskridge, the top selection of this year’s draft class for the Seattle Seahawks, was activated off the physically unable to perform list on Tuesday.
Eskridge took part in his first training camp practice with the team on a limited basis after missing close to three weeks due to a sore toe.
“He’s in incredible shape,” head coach Pete Carroll said of Eskridge after practice on Tuesday. “We really waited a long time to get him to the point where he would demonstrate that he could pound it with his breaks and bursts and full speed efforts and stuff like that. So now it’s all the learning stuff that he hasn’t been able to do by being on the field so I don’t know how long it’s gonna take putting all of that together.
The Seahawks found an adjustment to his equipment that helped negate the soreness Eskridge had been dealing with in his toe leading into camp. Then it was getting him conditioned to the point where he could return to the practice field. Eskridge was the 56th overall pick of this year’s draft in the second round for Seattle, who only had three total selections after a number of trades including the deal that brought Jamal Adams to the team last year.
The Seahawks are hoping Eskridge can bolster the receiving options for Russell Wilson beyond that of DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett this season. Seattle lacked a consistent third option in their passing game the second half of the season last year with defenses clamping down on Metcalf and Lockett to neuter the team’s attack.
Carroll said they believe Eskridge will be ready to go by the season opener against the Indianapolis Colts. However, he may not make it in time to get some preseason action in the team’s exhibition finale against the Los Angeles Chargers next week.
“We all think that he should be ready and raring to go by the opener. We’re not concerned about that time frame,” Carroll said. “It’s whether or not he can make it to this game in a couple weeks that, you know, we’d love for him to get some play-time to get started. I don’t know that that can happen. And we’re not going to press that.
“We did see him enough to see what he could do (in OTAs), you know, and he teased the heck out of us with his early showing and so we’ve been really waiting. Shane (Waldron)'s got a real good plan for him and how we’re going to incorporate him. Like I said, we’re not gonna overload him but we’re going to try to get him involved and that will happen. Well we’ll get that done.”