'Sense of urgency' for Justice

I talked to Winston Justice for about three minutes after this morning's practice, and I think he set a new record for most times saying "sense of urgency" during that short of an interview.

With the banged-up offensive line, Justice has been getting plenty of reps with the first team at right tackle.

Since no one seems to know when Shawn Andrews is going to return, and three of the other four projected starters have missed at least some time during the past two weeks, Justice's role with the 2009 Birds is uncertain.

I asked him if he's approaching the year as if he will be a starter, and he wouldn't go that far.

"I just have a sense of urgency this year," he said. "I approach every practice, every play with a sense of urgency and I feel good this year, the way I'm approaching it. And God willing, I get to have a lot more opportunities like this."

Justice said he switched things up this offseason in an offort to improve.

"This offseason I did a lot of things different," he said. "I stayed in Philly, worked up here, did some extra reps with [offensive line coach] Juan Castillo."

But will it pay off?

It's funny how in football, and really all of professional sports, one game can define you, for better or for worse. With Justice, of course, it was the Osi Umenyiora game. For a guy like David Tyree, it was the Super Bowl.

The game is unforgiving. If you have one bad game, you don't know when your next opportunity will be to show people you're better, that you can improve.

And that's the case with Justice. But given the way camp has played out, it looks like his time is coming, whether he's ready or not.

I asked him if the coaches have talked to him about having an increased role this season.

"I'm just worried about if I get out there, I need to perform," he said. "I'm not trying to weigh out what's gonna happen here, what's gonna happen here. I think you can't approach it that way. You just have to go. You can't be thinking about what if this happens, what if this happens. I need to make it happen."

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Below is our video report with Rich Hofmann, who tries to gauge just how devastating this training camp has been for the Birds.

Much more later, including observations from the practices and nuggets from a conversation I had with defensive end Bryan Smith.