Three Panthers Tight Ends Dealing with Injuries

Carolina's tight end room is getting a little thin.

Stephen Lew-USA TODAY Sports

The Panthers haven't been able to string together a series of practices with a full compliment of tight ends through the first couple weeks of training camp. Tommy Tremble went out early on and now, Ian Thomas is being bugged with a calf injury.

Saturday afternoon, head coach Dave Canales provided some insight on each of them and their timeline to return.

“Tommy is probably a week-ish out with the hamstring. Just trying to get him to full health before we get him back out there. Ian’s got a calf that’s going to take some time. That’s going to take us really closely up to Week 1. Our goal is to just get those guys back. Instead of forcing them back out here, let’s make sure we get them healthy and feel really good about getting them back out."

In addition to those two, Stephen Sullivan was recently placed on injured reserve with a hip injury. So in the meantime, fourth-round pick Ja'Tavion Sanders and the recently signed Felipe Franks will see a ton of work come their way. Sanders had a really strong practice at FanFest, which included a touchdown in the back corner of the end zone.

“It’s exponential growth. Every day," Canales said about Sanders. "Especially for the young guys, as they start to stack up technique and reps, especially for Ja’Tavion whether it’s in the run game, in the pass game, or the protection unit…what I’ve seen him do is really take big leaps in the techniques. You’ll see that with young guys and the big leaps, but you want to get that to a point where it’s consistent.”

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