Andre Johnson may be close to returning after suffering a concussion in Sunday's 30-24 overtime win against the Titans. Johnson is in the final stage of the league's concussion protocol which involves practicing with pads.
"Andre's fine," head coach Gary Kubiak said. "He's doing really good. Expectations are for him to practice tomorrow with his pads on and that's the last stage before you can before on to playing again. So the expectations are for him to be able to do that. If today's an indicator, then we should be there tomorrow."
Kubiak is optimistic that Johnson could be cleared as soon as Thursday and ready to play in Sunday's game at Baltimore.
"Yeah, from what I'm seeing right now, yeah," Kubiak said. "There's still that stage, wherever the stage is, I know the last stage is practicing in pads again with the team. So that's the expected to happen tomorrow. I just walked in with him here, so the expectations are for him to do that and we're on to Friday and ready to go."
Johnson left Sunday's game against the Titans with just over two minutes remaining. Titans' safety Bernard Pollard landed a shoulder-to-helmet hit to Johnson, who maintained possession of his catch despite the collision. Pollard tweeted on Wednesday that he will be fined $42,000 for the hit which was not penalized during the game.
