Bears linebacker Roquan Smith stopped practicing Tuesday afternoon because of tightness in his lower left hamstring, coach Matt Nagy said. The first-round rookie was shut down as a precaution and might practice Wednesday, Nagy said.
At the very least, though, the muscle tightness does nothing to further Smith's readiness for the season opener Sept. 9 against the Packers. In fact, before practice, Smith was asked about his greatest hurdle to being ready for Week 1.
"Just being in football shape," he said. "You work out and do all the running you can, but it's nothing like football shape."
Smith missed all 16 training camp practices as part of a 29-day contract holdout that ended Aug. 14. Tuesday's practice was just his fourth of the preseason and only second in pads.
"We have to be a little bit careful because we don't know where he's at (physically)," Nagy said. "Any time you end up having something like this where you just feel even the slightest thing _ OK, we want to make sure we're being smart about it."
Smith participated to a limited extent in practices last Wednesday and Thursday with the Broncos in Denver. The Bears have been intent on gradually increasing his workload as they gauge his physical condition.
"That's exactly why we do what we do," Nagy said. "You put him in early and he's not ready, then something like this happens where it gets worse. So we just want to be really cautionary with it."
Smith remained present at practice for its duration. He did some exercise in a sand pit that the Bears' new strength and conditioning staff installed near their new practice field in the offseason.
The Bears host the Chiefs on Saturday at noon in their penultimate preseason game. Smith's availability for that will be determined later this week.
"It's probably an hour-by-hour thing right now, where he's at," Nagy said. "We've just got to see how he responds tomorrow and have a better idea."
