Injury Report: "Nobody is listed as out here. [TE] Brent Celek did the walkthrough. I'll probably hold him out of the practice this afternoon with a sore back. [WR] Jeremy Maclin is doing a little bit better with the plantar fasciitis. We'll just see how he progresses here as we go. Everybody else is going to be out there practicing and doing their thing."

Opening Remarks:"We look forward to the challenge of playing the 49ers. I think all of our players and coaches saw the Monday night game and how they came in and really dominated in that game. If you look at the scores of their games with the exception of the Atlanta game, they've either won the games or they've been within a touchdown or field goal of winning the games. They're a good football team is what I'm saying. They played us very tough last year. We understand they've taken on the personality of their head coach, Mike Singletary. He's done a heck of a job there and my hat's off to them. Our guys are going to prepare for a tough football team coming in here and we'll be ready."

On whether Maclin will practice and whether he will be ruled out for Sunday's game: "Maclin will not practice today, not ruling him out [for Sunday]."

On what the plan for RB Brian Westbrook will be at practice: "Scout team right now."

On whether he likes playing a team that is coming off of a win: "I don't really care either way. I think you have to prepare yourself right each week in this league. This league is crazy. There's so much parity that you slight somebody and you're in trouble. With this group here it didn't take very long to figure out that they're a good football team. To answer your question, I don't really care either way. We understand what they are; they're a very good football team so that's the way we're approaching it."

On whether he saw something over the years that made him realize a tough training camp would lead to success at the end of the season: "No, not necessarily. I think that blocking and tackling is a part of the game and we could do better in both of those areas. That's something we can take out of this past game that we can get better at. We are going to go back to the fundamentals, but they start in training camp and normally the thing you find with a tough training camp is that you have a pretty good idea who is going to be with you, unless a major injury takes place, who's going to be with you come this time of the year.

"This is a tough time of the year for players because their bodies are obviously beat up and they have to be mentally tough to push through. You find out during that time, early, when their bodies are fresh, that third, fourth, fifth day of training camp the guys who are going to wilt and the guys that are going to push through. I think that part is probably what you get out of that."

On how much better Celek's back feels: "It's still sore, but it's getting better. He should be ready to go this weekend."

On whether Celek's back pain was caused by a hit: "No, he hadn't had anything. He was in a meeting and stood up and it just caught on him. He's not a back problem guy. It's kind of a weird deal. They worked on him and were able to get him ready for the game. It's calming down. I think he's going to be fine."

On whether he is worried about Celek having long-term back problems: "I'm not. Somebody asked me if that's why we brought [TE Martin] Rucker up. That's not why we brought Rucker up. I just thought he's practiced worthy of being on the roster. I'd like him here as an Eagle. When you're on practice squad you risk him being able to go somewhere else."

On whether he has any idea what happened to Rucker's career after being picked high in the draft by the Browns: "I know exactly what happened. At the University of Missouri they run the spread offense and he was more of a flexed out tight end, wasn't asked to block much at all. That's what he's been working on the last couple of years here. He is trying to put himself in a position where he can block and be respectable there.

"He's added some weight and strength and he's worked like crazy to get that part of his game down. Is he where he wants to be? No, not yet. But he's working at it and I think he'll get there. As a receiver he's very, very talented and he's improved tremendously as a blocker. At Cleveland they weren't in a position where they could wait for that development. They moved on and that's our gain here."

On whether he would compare Rucker to TE Cornelius Ingram: "It would be similar."

On what he sees from 49ers RB Frank Gore and QB Alex Smith: "Both of them I think are playing very well. Gore is such a physical runner and also he has great vision and great feet, good lateral vision. He's proven that over the years. He's a heck of a player. Alex has really worked into a second coming here of what he was. He was the starter, first-round draft pick, so on, and then he was benched and he is on a comeback here and he's been doing very well.

"I think he has a really good feel for the short, intermediate routes, very accurate. He's utilizing the tight end who's playing very well right now. The rookie wide receiver is a nice addition. He's really good after the catch. He is surrounded by people that are good football players and he knows how to get it to them."

On what is keeping Westbrook from taking reps with the ones in practice: "I'm just getting him back into football shape. It literally couldn't do anything for a couple of weeks there. You can't throw him back in. He's still taking the concussion tests. He's better, but not all the way completely cleared there. We're still doing that as his exercise increases. They'll keep testing him until they're comfortable with where he's at."

On whether WR Kevin Curtis will take reps with the scouting team or the ones in practice: "He probably will be doing a little bit of both. Because of the injury to Maclin we're going to ask him to do a few things in there. Again, it would be a limited basis there."

On whether Curtis' limitations on special teams make him a difficult player to place on the active roster in Maclin's place: "Not necessarily, because he wouldn't be replacing a guy that was doing a lot on special teams so you're okay there. I'm saying Jeremy, Jeremy was strictly doing wide receiver stuff. And it's not going to limit Reggie because Reggie was just doing a little bit there as a rotational gunner. I don't think that's a problem. I'm not going to just throw him in there as a starter and let him go. That's not what's going to happen."

On whether he is planning for Sunday's game as if Westbrook was not playing: "I am today. It's a day to day thing here. He wants to be back in there. This is working with the trainers and the doctors on this. This isn't something that Brian is trying to duck out of or anything, it's just the opposite there. We have to do what's best for him."

On whether Westbrook has had any symptoms recently:"I think actually he's feeling pretty good. It's just they give him these tests and if it's off an inch they're very cautious with that, and understandably so."

On what would be considered being off by an inch in a concussion test: "(Jokingly) If you are sticking a square peg in a round hole. I don't know exactly what part, I'm not that astute on the test itself."

On whether the test looks at Westbrook's balance and reactions: "It's not that."

On whether the issue is that Westbrook feels fine but the test shows that he's not ready yet: "It's what the doctors read off of the test. We send these out to Pittsburgh, make sure the doctors read and analyze it and if it's not perfect then he's not going to play. That's just the way it is. [Head athletic trainer] Rick [Burkholder] can probably be more detailed with what they ask on the test."

On whether he thinks LB Akeem Jordan and CB Joselio Hanson's rustiness was part of the reason the defense didn't play well last Sunday: "We asked Joselio to play a lot of plays which is tough to do after being out. He had missed four games there. He got tired as it went on. He did a respectable job. Akeem was coming off of an injury, so he didn't play a bunch. We just spotted him in there which we wanted to do, just kind of ease him in there and get him back used to playing. He did okay. He had some good snaps. It was spread out amongst everybody, between coaches, players. We all had a piece of that and we have to do better as a unit."

On where he plans to play Jordan among the linebackers on Sunday: "We'll probably continue on with the mix as we go here. We'll see how that works out."

On whether they will continue to shuffle guys in and out at safety: "We moved guys around in there depending on what they're presenting. They were throwing situations and [S] Quinitin [Demps] does a pretty good job in those situations. He was in on some of that."

On where he would rate QB Donovan McNabb's season this year as compared to other seasons: "(Joking) I don't like that question. He's doing a nice job. I can't tell you any more than [that] I think he's a future Hall of Fame quarterback. That's how I feel about him. I think that's the highest praise you can give somebody in this profession. I think the world of the guy on and off the field in the way he conducts himself. He just does it right. He deserves every accolade that he gets from this sport."