Vikings injury update: Dalvin Cook full participant for first time since Week 2

As the Minnesota Vikings continue preparing to face the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday afternoon at U.S. Bank Stadium, they once again got some good news and some bad news.

We’ll start with the bad news this time, as both offensive tackle Riley Reiff (foot) and safety Andrew Sendejo (groin) sat out of Thursday’s practice session. It’s officially getting into worrisome territory for both of those guys, as for much of the Mike Zimmer era guys that haven’t practiced during the week have not played on Sunday. Of course, that might not apply to Reiff. . .he didn’t practice at all leading up to the Week 4 contest against the Los Angeles Rams and started in that game anyway.

As we mentioned yesterday, if Reiff is unable to go on Sunday, we can probably expect a similar configuration to what we saw last Sunday in Philadelphia, with Rashod Hill moving over to left tackle and rookie Brian O’Neill slotting in at right tackle.

Defensive end Tashawn Bower (ankle) also sat out his second consecutive practice. If that trend continues, the Vikings could find themselves in the same situation as last week, with Danielle Hunter and Stephen Weatherly as their only two true defensive ends.

On the plus side, for the first time since Week 2, running back Dalvin Cook was a full participant in practice. Cook, who has missed two and a half of the last three games (he did play in the first half against the Rams) has been dealing with a hamstring injury since getting hurt in overtime of the Week 2 tie in Green Bay. Even though the Minnesota running game did find a little more room last week against the Eagles, it certainly would be nice to have Cook out there to help the Vikings’ offense regain some balance.

Both the Vikings and the Cardinals will have their final injury reports out tomorrow afternoon, and when they put those together we will have them here for your reading pleasure.