A.J. Green, Carl Lawson at Bengals practice

The last month has not been kind to an already battered Bengals team. They’ve barely been able to field a healthy 46-man roster for the last couple of weeks.

Entering the second half of their schedule, things seem to finally be trending upwards. The Bengals saw several notable players suit up for practice today, including A.J. Green, Carl Lawson and Darqueze Dennard.

Green was beginning to practice with the team for the first time last week, and with plans to make his season debut this upcoming Sunday, it appears no setbacks have been suffered.

Lawson and Dennard each missed the team’s last two games but appear to be on track to return to the defense this week.

On the offensive line, Andre Smith was cleared to play in Week 8 against the Rams after missing the previous two games with an ankle injury but did not make an appearance. It’ll be interesting to see if he returns to the starting lineup along with John Miller, who has also missed the last two games.

Miller’s replacement, Alex Redmond, is not practicing today alongside Dre Kirkpatrick, who has been out since he hurt his knee in Week 6 against the Ravens.

In other promising news, the Bengals are expecting Darius Phillips and John Ross III to eventually make their returns off of the Reserve/Injured list in less than a month.

Phillips and Ross’ injuries occurred early enough in the season for the team to designate them as returnees. Each NFL team can return two players off of IR after they’ve been on the list for eight weeks. Phillips still has two more weeks until he can return, while Ross has to wait three more weeks.