Dupree Ready When Coaches Say Go

The free-agent linebacker says the waiting game is the only thing keeping him from playing again after reconstructive knee surgery.

NASHVILLE – The only thing Bud Dupree needs now is permission.

The Tennessee Titans outside linebacker does not need a brace, a sleeve or support of any kind for his surgically constructed knee, not based on his participation in practices for the last week and a half, at least. He does not need any assurance from medical personnel to put his mind at ease. He does not need any motivation beyond a simple desire to play the game.

All that stands between him and the prominent place that awaits him in the Titans defense is the go-ahead from the team’s coaching and medical staffs.

“If you’re a football player, you definitely want to be on the field every day you see somebody else on the field,” Dupree said Monday. “You never want to be on the sideline. But with a situation like I’m in, it’s just something that takes time. That’s just Mother Nature. Everything I’m doing is A1. Everything the coaches and the trainers are doing is A1. So, now it’s just a waiting game.

“I’m going to be ready whenever they call me. If they tell me to go out tomorrow, I can go do it.”

Next up for Tennessee in its preparation for the 2021 NFL season is two days of joint workouts with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (Wednesday and Thursday) ahead of a preseason meeting between those teams Saturday at Raymond James Stadium. The Buccaneers, of course, are the reigning Super Bowl champions and feature quarterback Tom Brady, which makes this opportunity to work together a unique one for the Titans.

“They’re Super Bowl champs, man,” Dupree said. “… They still have the same team. Brady brought everybody back. So, them having the same team, you get to really test yourself when you go out and measure up against the best.”

For Dupree, though, it likely will further test his patience.

The expectation is that the high-priced free agent (he signed a five-year, $82.5 million contract in March) will be a limited participant in the practice sessions and will not play in the game. That is consistent with what he has done since he passed his physical days into training camp and was cleared to take part in workouts.

It is still progress from the start of camp, which opened with Dupree on the Physically Unable to Perform list. And he is a long way from where he was a little more than eight months ago when he underwent a procedure to repair a torn ligament, an injury that cut short his sixth and final season with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

“I don’t feel a difference in the legs right now,” he said. “So, that’s a good thing from my doctor and the rehab people who I have been working with.

“… I attack each day how they want me to. I go in with the same mindset – getting better and better each day … so I won’t have any setbacks when the season starts.”

That remains the goal. All indications are that the Titans’ focus with Dupree is – and has been – for him to ready Week 1 when they host the Arizona Cardinals, and the 16 games that follow. If that means he needs to sit out an occasional training camp practice or watch all of the preseason games from the sidelines, so be it.

Dupree is willing to wait.

“I control the controllables,” he said. “That’s how you stay level-headed, man and don’t stress yourself out. I just control what I can control. What I can’t control, I don’t let it bother me or let it stress me out. I just sit back and do the best at what I got to do at that moment.”

And wait until he gets the full go.