At his Monday press conference Andy Reid updated the status of Shawn Andrews, who has been missing from the lineup since week 2 but was never put on injured reserve. Andrews flew out to California yesterday to meet with his back specialist and if he gets the all clear, he could be back on the practice field this week.
Reid would not offer any specifics, but did say there was a chance Andrews could return to practice as soon as this week.
"We'll see what the doctor says," Reid said. "If he OK's it, then we would allow him to get back out and start practicing. He's been doing a lot of cardio work, so that part of being in shape won't be a problem. The actual football shape, we'd have to let him kind of start off slow and get back in the swing of it."
I guess this begs the question, what do you do if Andrews is indeed healthy enough to play? Combine the fact that Nick Cole has been playing very well with the fact that Andrews had very little preseason and very few games this year... It's hard to say that Andrews would be likely to do a better job than Cole right now.
I would be glad to hear that Andrew's back issue is behind him and that he'll be 100% heading into next year. We can't forget that when he's 100% Shawn Andrews is a perennial pro bowl and one of the best offensive lineman in the game... but for the rest of this issue I'd prefer to see Nick Cole out there.