COSTA MESA, Calif. -- Los Angeles Chargers wide receivers Keenan Allen and Mike Williams have not played a complete game together all season.
Allen, who suffered a hamstring injury in Week 1 against the Las Vegas Raiders, has yet to return to full strength. He returned briefly and played on a pitch count in Week 7 against the Seattle Seahawks, which happened to be the same game Williams suffered a high ankle sprain in.
Neither player has seen game action since Week 7, but that could change Sunday night against the Kansas City Chiefs.
“It would mean a lot,” Williams told NFL Media on Wednesday. “It’s Sunday Night Football, not just necessarily the Chiefs, but it’s another opportunity for me to go out there and showcase what I can do. If I’m able to do it, I’m for sure out there.”
So far in the Chargers' 5-4 season, Allen and Williams have shared the field for just 43 offensive plays -- all of which came in the first halves of Los Angeles' Week 1 and Week 7 games. That accounts for just 7.1% of the team's 608 offensive snaps this season, per NFL Research.
The two returned to practice on Wednesday and were listed as limited participants, just as they were on Thursday, though they appeared to be doing more drills than the previous day during the media-accessible portion of practice.
“I feel like everybody kind of already know, everybody kind of already know what it is with us,” Williams said. “Not too much needs to be said with that. We just have to get him [Allen] back in the grove of things. Obviously, he’s been dealing with what he’s been dealing with the whole season, but it would be good to get us both back and both in the groove.”
Both Allen and Williams said they felt good and suffered no setbacks after Wednesday’s practice.
When asked Thursday if he thought he would play come Sunday, Allen replied, “Yeah, right now, yeah.”
Allen said he will make the decision for sure on either Friday or Saturday, but he knows he can’t get too ahead of himself because he’s been in this position, of feeling good, before.
“It's kind of a roller-coaster ride up and down,” Allen said Thursday. “Some days it's good, then it's bad, then back to good, then bad again.”
“There's always hope. It’s not season-ending, that's enough hope in itself that I got a chance to get back. It's kind of frustrating like I say, you just got to wait and play it by ear, day by day and hope that it responds the right way.”
The most frustrating part?
“Not being able to play,” Allen said.
Allen expressed earlier in the season that he wasn’t interested in returning halfway, saying he didn't want to suffer another setback.
“I would just be smart about it," said when he was asked about potentially playing on a pitch count. "I mean if it comes down to a pitch count, then that's what it's going to be. But I mean, at some point I got to get back in there.
“ I want to play, so if that's what it takes then that's what it takes.”
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