OT Teven Jenkins returns to practice, denies clashing with coaches

Chicago Bears offensive tackle Teven Jenkins returned to training camp Saturday after missing seven straight practices with an undisclosed injury.

"I would say that we're ramping him up," said coach Matt Eberflus. "Today, he did individual and tomorrow we'll ramp it up. Typically, the way the model works is that a guy's coming off of whatever the issue is, he now goes into individual and then we ramp him up, we ramp his reps up. Then it's up to a full period, then two periods, then three periods, then kind of work from there."

Jenkins indicated that he felt "really good" after taking part in Saturday's practice.

"I'm not having any discomfort right now," he said. "It's just about working my body back into the feeling of football back again and getting back to that 100 percent of 'this is football' and get ready to go."


The second-year player agreed that it hasn't been easy being sidelined.

"It's very frustrating not to go," Jenkins said. "But that's the way of the world. That's OK. It's what's going to happen."

He mentioned that his fiancée has helped him deal with the adversity.

"I talk to her night and day, whenever I can, and she helps me through a lot," he said.

His absence was particularly noticeable at Halas Hall amid trade rumors involving Jenkins. Earlier this week, he replied to a fan on Twitter concerned about his well-being to "not believe everything you read" in light of reports of mutual malcontent between the player and the franchise.