Bears outside linebacker Leonard Floyd ready to rock with club

SHARE Bears outside linebacker Leonard Floyd ready to rock with club
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Bears outside linebacker Leonard Floyd practiced in full Wednesday. (AP)

There’s no doubt outside linebacker Leonard Floyd will play Sunday.

The question is, how will he feel? Literally.

Floyd’s right hand will be in a club-like cast, meaning he won’t be able to grab a blocker or a ballcarrier or the football.

“It’s just not being able to open my hand to, like, catch or break or something,” he said. “Other than that, it’s OK.”

Floyd said he didn’t know how long he would need the club. The Bears’ Week 5 bye might be a perfect time to transition away from it.

A player who improved his hand-fighting during training camp will have to make due, at least for a few weeks, after having surgery Aug. 19 to repair the hand he broke against the Broncos. He hurt his hand near his middle and index fingers.

Floyd is excited to join the team’s reworked linebacker corps, which features Khalil Mack on the outside and Danny Trevathan and Roquan Smith inside. Aaron Lynch practiced in full Wednesday after missing all but the first day of training camp with a hamstring problem.

“We can accomplish anything,” Floyd said. “All we’ve got to do is be coachable, learn from our mistakes and go out and execute.”

Rivalry talk

Coach Matt Nagy will tell his players more about the Bears-Packers rivalry later this week, not that they need further motivation.

“It’s absolutely huge,” he said. “We don’t need to talk about it too much amongst each other, but as a team we will. So what we’ll do is we’ll discuss it. We’ll educate them on the history and the tradition and what it means to so many different people in this area and in Green Bay.

“But we don’t want to get to a point where you’re worried so much about that that it takes away what you’re doing with your assignments. It’s important. We get it. First game of the season, on the road, us as a kind of starting this new thing going on here, so they’re will be some challenges for sure.”

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This and that

Defensive back DeAndre Houston-Carson, who broke his forearm against the Broncos, was the only player on the 53-man roster held out of practice.

— Tight end Daniel Brown was limited with the shoulder injury he suffered in the preseason finale against the Bills.

— Packers safety Josh Jones (ankle) didn’t practice, while linebackers Oren Brooks (shoulder) and James Crawford (hamstring) were limited.

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