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LAKE FOREST, Ill. – Rome Odunze stood before the media on Friday afternoon, talking about the prospects of playing the Houston Texans a few days later.

This discussion occurred not too long after taking what looked like a brutal hit to the knee in a Week 1 win over Tennessee. To go from that moment to this one should be considered a fortunate turn for the No. 9 overall NFL draft pick.

Odunze suffered an MCL sprain – a relatively positive outcome considering other knee injuries could’ve ended his season – and was back at practice in a limited capacity on Friday. And, after all that, he was designated as questionable to play the Texans in Week 2.

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“(I) felt good,” Odunze said. “Just trying to get back to being myself out there and that’s the only product I want to put out on the field, so today was a little bit of a test of that and it felt good, so we’ll see what happens moving forward.” 

Odunze said how he feels on Saturday will be telling about his phase of the recovery process. The Bears will also put him through a pre-game warmup on Sunday night and see where he’s at.

Odunze said he’s not worried about making it worse by playing so soon after the injury.

“That’s definitely not my concern,” he said. “I think that was my first initial question — if I was at any risk for that to happen and talking to the doctors, I think the opinions that I’ve gotten, that’s not their opinion of it. Of course, there’s some soreness and some pain in there with a sprain that it is. But no, if there was any risk of anything further then I wouldn’t be out there.”

He’s in a better place now but was fairly concerned about the injury shortly after the game.

“I had some soreness after the game and things like that,” Odunze said. “Soreness continued to build and then that night the soreness was pretty bad. Next morning, the soreness was pretty bad. At that point, it was my mindset that I might have done something wrong to it which led me to get the MRI and get the doctor’s opinion as well as a second opinion to make sure it’s all good, especially because it’s a knee injury. But the soreness has dwindled, continued movement and mobility has continued to grow. I think those things are important.”

Odunze hasn’t dealt with knee issues before — he said he heard a pop when the injury happened — so he has been reliant on physicians and peers who have gone through injuries like this. He’s trying to be smart with the situation, weighing all factors and making the right decisions for his health and for his team.

“I think it’s just like any injury in the fact that it’s a pain level, pain tolerance thing,” Odunze said. “I think, when you’ve answered the question whether it’s structurally sound and whether or not you’re at risk of further injuring it, I think that’s the number one question you need to answer.

“Then after that, it’s can you be yourself out there? Can you play through the pain? What’s the soreness going to be like the next day? Are you going to be able to weather through that? For me, it’s just that pain tolerance at this point and being able to work through what I can work through.”

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