While he was designated to return from Injured Reserve last week, Derrick Henry was not activated from the list and ended up sitting out the Tennessee Titans’ regular-season finale against the Houston Texans.
The victory gave the Titans the No. 1 seed and a first-round bye, which in turn gives Henry more time to get back into the swing of things.
On Monday, head coach Mike Vrabel said the Titans will continue to monitor Henry’s progress and will see how he responds to “cutting” and “reactionary stuff,” per Jim Wyatt of Titans Online.
“We talk about the same things all the time about the players that are returning from injury, the ones that go back into the football game,” Vrabel said. “(It’s) ‘Can they make whatever they have worse? Can they protect themselves? And, can they reasonably do their job?’ So, I think for Derrick, having not been out there, I think there’s going to be some looks that he’s going to have to get in practice. We’re going to have to see how he responds to some cutting and some reactionary stuff. We’ll continue to look and see how he is progressing, and then we’ll make a decision.”
On Tuesday, offensive coordinator Todd Downing said the training staff would dictate how much Henry does each day at practice.
.@Titans OC Todd Downing: Coach Vrabel and the training staff will let me know the workload expected of @KingHenry_2 each day, and we'll go from there in practices
— Jim Wyatt (@jwyattsports) January 11, 2022
The biggest concern for Henry when he does suit up in the Divisional Round will be rust, as the Alabama product hasn’t taken a single snap since Week 8.
It remains to be seen if Henry will take on his usual heavy workload in his first game back or if conditioning will limit his snaps, but if there’s anyone capable of overcoming the rust factor, it’s The King.
