G Kyle Long, WR Markus Wheaton return to Bears practice

SHARE G Kyle Long, WR Markus Wheaton return to Bears practice
gettyimages_460525966.jpg

Bears guard Kyle Long won the Bears’ Ed Block Courage Award. (Getty Images)

Kyle Long returned to practice Thursday for the first time since the team returned home from Bourbonnais, and Markus Wheaton took the field for the first time since having surgery to repair a broken pinkie finger.

Though both were limited, their participation qualified as good news for the Bears, whose season begins Sunday against the Falcons.

Fox said Long has to prove that he can go Sunday in the next two days — “It’s just, healthy or not healthy,” he said — as he continues to recover from ankle surgery.

Wheaton seems farther away; he started the week being able to catch only Nerf footballs.

Cornerback Prince Amukamara (ankle) was the only Bears player who didn’t practice Thursday.

Outside linebacker Pernell McPhee (knee) was limited again after coming off the physically unable to perform list Saturday. Defensive coordinator Vic Fangio said that “I think there’s a good chance” he’ll play Sunday, but said the training staff told him McPhee might be on a pitch count against the Falcons.


The Latest
Unite Here Local 1, representing the workers at the Signature Room and its lounge, said in a lawsuit in October the employer failed to give 60 days notice of a closing or mass layoff, violating state law.
Uecker has been synonymous with Milwaukee baseball for over half a century.
Doctors say looking at the April 8 eclipse without approved solar glasses — which are many times darker than sunglasses — can lead to retinal burns and can result in blind spots and permanent vision loss.
Antoine Perteet, 33, targeted victims on the dating app Grindr, according to Chicago police.
Glass-facade buildings can disorient birds in flight. The city is expected to update and revise rules for new developments and rehabbed buildings next month. But bird groups say the proposed guidelines need to be mandatory.