PHILADELPHIA (973espn.com) - The Eagles are 24 days away from their season opener against the Atlanta Falcons and WR1 Alshon Jeffery is still not practicing.

That has NFL Media's Ian Rapoport speculating that the veteran could remain on the PUP list at the start of the regular season, something that would erase the first six weeks of the season for Jeffery.

As evidenced by the uproar over an unfounded rumor about Dallas Goedery's minor elbow injury over the weekend any "news" regarding the Super Bowl champions tends to be blown out of proportion.

So Rapoport's slickly-worded tweets likely generated traffic but no new information unless you consider explaining the NFL's PUP rules and offering up every option under those rules, which has already been done numerous times, some kind of new information.

Eagles coach Doug Pederson actually offered an update on Jeffery this past Saturday.

"He's doing a great job with his rehab," the coach said. "He's in, I would say, more the strength phase with the weights and that part. He's still doing his lower body conditioning with running and doing some things that way with his legs, making sure his cardiovascular is good.

"He can't do a ton of stuff yet necessarily on the field because of the motion of the arm swing, but we can get him in the tanks, the pools, the Alter Gs, things like that, and get his cardio up. But kind of in the strength phase right now and really doing a nice job."

A quick check of the rehab schedule for the typical rotator-cuff procedure puts "strengthening" as Recovery Phase 3 (after "Passive Motion" and "Active Motion") of 4 with the final hurdle being full activity with six months as the end of the timetable.

Jeffery underwent surgery in February and six months from that would be, you guessed it, August.

Week 1 has always been the goal with Jeffery and nothing has changed. It's conceivable he could miss a game or two but in that case the Eagles would carry him on the 53-man roster and make him inactive on game days until he's ready. Starting the season on the PUP list remains very unlikely.

-John McMullen covers the Eagles and the NFL for 973espn.com. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen

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