'A beautiful surprise.' Sheldon Rankins returns to Saints practice with an eye on what's next.

The Saints' top interior defender is back at practice seven months and two weeks after an Achilles injury suffered in a playoff game.

New Orleans Saints defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins (98) celebrates a tackle in the first quarter against the Atlanta Falcons at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Mandatory Credit: Chuck Cook-USA TODAY Sports

METAIRIE, La. — This was supposed to be just another day in the long recovery from an Achilles injury, one that caused Sheldon Rankins to leave the last game he played on a cart.

Instead, the New Orleans Saints defensive tackle received what he said was "a beautiful surprise" from the team athletic training staff.

"They told me, 'Hey, you're practicing,'" Rankins said Monday.

The Saints still don't expect to have their top interior defender back for the Week 1 home game against the Houston Texans. "That would be unrealistic," coach Sean Payton said. But sometime during the brutal opening stretch of the schedule would seem reasonable.

By unexpectedly lifting Rankins from the Physically Unable to Perform list so he could practice Monday, the Saints revealed their belief Rankins will be game-ready before the minimum six-week requirement for anyone who begins the season with the PUP designation.

Following the opener against the Texans, the Saints have successive road games against the Rams and Seahawks — they'll spend a full week out west between those games — before a return home for a prime-time meeting with the Cowboys.

To make room on the roster for Rankins, the Saints put tight end Garrett Griffin I’m injured reserve after he left Saturday against the Jets on a cart.

Rankins is seven months and two weeks removed from the Achilles tear that put him on a cart midway through the first quarter of a home playoff win against the Philadelphia Eagles. That's not how any football player wants to leave a game, let alone a victory that put his team one step closer to a Super Bowl berth that ultimately proved elusive.

He arrived at the team training facility Monday unaware he would be cleared to participate in that day’s practice. The wait was a long time coming.

"The thing with the Achilles is the way it has to heal — your Achilles is essentially a rubber band," Rankins explained. "It needs to heal in a certain position to maintain that powerful stretch. 

"For so long (during the recovery), you’re essentially just laying there with your foot there, there’s nothing you can really do. And even then, once it’s healed to a certain point orthopaedically, you have to slowly but surely gain that flexibility back, that strength back. You can’t force anything on it.

"It’s one of those things you have to let time heal, in a sense. Let the biological clock take over. If you rush it, you push yourself back and now you’re causing more harm than good."

New Orleans Saints defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins (98) is carted from the field after suffering an apparent injury during the first quarter of a NFC Divisional playoff football game against the Philadelphia Eagles at Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Mandatory Credit: John David Mercer-USA TODAY Sports

The recovery came sooner than even Payton might have expected. The coach said he hadn’t seen a player recover from an Achilles as quick as Rankins.

“A player has an injury like that, 10 people have it, and the recovery, just based on a lot of things, can vary,” Payton said. “Obviously, we're encouraged that he's at the stage he's at right now.”

Rankins arrived on the indoor practice field in a white jersey with black No. 98 over a long-sleeved white shirt with an NFL logo on the sleeve with black athletic pants and white cleats.

Teammates greeted him by doing the signature shoulder shimmy he used to celebrate his career-high eight sacks last season. Not everybody did it correctly.

"I kindly had to give the lesson on how to do it," Rankins said with a smile.

Rankins went through the usual pre-practice stretches and then did something required off all players: he did 40 exhausting up-downs as his teammates watched.

"That’s the buy-in," Rankins said. "Everybody usually does it together during OTAs (during the spring), but I wasn’t granted that luxury."

Regardless, Rankins said he'd rather do those up-downs without pads inside the air-conditioned facility. His teammates did them outdoors in the sun and humidity. Call it a silver lining.

The team practiced Monday without pads. Next for Rankins will be to go through a full-contact workout, one that means taking on blockers and pursuing ball-carriers. It's the step he cannot wait to complete.

At that point, he'll follow the advice given by Alex Okafor, a former Saints defensive end who also overcame an Achilles tear before his return in 2018.

"When you're ready, cut it loose," Okafor told him. "Don't think. Don't hesitate. Don't baby it. When you get that thought in your head, 'Yeah, I can do this,' just cut it loose and go play. The rest will take care of itself."

To cut it loose. That's something teammates are eager to see.

"He's a guy who works extremely hard and carries himself like a pro," said quarterback Teddy Bridgewater, whose experience coming back from a serious injury is well known. "The guys respect him for the way he carries himself. He comes to work every day and he commands greatness from that defensive line and the defense. ... He's all about football."

This isn't the first time Rankins missed extended time because of injury. 

The first-round selected defender from Louisville missed the first seven games of his rookie season in 2016 with a broken fibula suffered in training camp. 

By the next season, he became a full-time starter. That's the status he'll continue to carry once fully cleared to play. 

Before Monday, he wondered when that day might come. Now back on the practice field, he can’t help know it will be sooner than he thought. A beautiful surprise, indeed.