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After suffering a serious knee injury in last season's Week 6 loss to the Colts, Yanda had surgery on his ACL in January.

The 24-year-old right tackle has worked his way back to the point that he can run, quickly change directions and participate in "starts and stances" drills with the rest of the offensive line, but he still has to avoid all contact.

The normal recovery time for an ACL surgery is six to eight months, which gives Yanda a tentative window of July to September. But the 6-foot-3, 310 pound gentle giant isn't going to rush anything; he's shooting for a full return sometime late in the summer.

"Hopefully I'd like to get in there sometime in August," Yanda told me this week during the Ravens' passing camp. "Late August I'd love to get back. But like I said I'm not going to push it. I want to get back there as fast as I can, but it's going to be the healthiest way, too.

"I'm not going to rush it and then have something nick me three or four months down the road. When I'm healthy and they give me the green light, I want to be able to just go."

The Ravens will hold their final training camp practice August 23, so it's likely that Yanda will miss most if not all of the practices held up in Westminster. But don't go thinking that just because Yanda won't be strapping on the pads and giving it a full-go, he won't be working out on his own.

Marshal will continue his workout regimen at McDaniel College, and he said his role will gradually pick up as the summer progresses.

The entire rehab process has been tough on Yanda, who also had surgery on his MCL and PCL in October, soon after the Colts game. Prior to the knee injury, he was viewed as one of the key pieces on a young but talented Ravens O-line but for the last eight months he's been stuck watching things from the sidelines.

"It's one of the hardest things I've ever had to do in my entire life," Yanda said. "I've never missed a game, and last year I was out for the entire year. It was tough. It's tough right now sitting around watching practice. I've always been the guy that's been out there, I'm never sitting watching, so it's tough every day.

"You get a salty taste in your mouth, and you've got to try and find a positive in it. My positive has just been lifting weights harder and trying to build and get stronger upper body-wise. You can't control this, you can't control injuries in football, they happen and you've just got to deal with them."

While Yanda is confident he can get right back to playing like his old self, he's unsure of how he'll respond to the lack of contact during training camp and if it will affect him when meaningful games roll around.

"I've never been injured, I've never had to come back from an injury, so I don't know yet," he said. "I'm just kind of taking care of right now and then we'll go from there. If I'm not ready, I'm not ready. When I am ready, I'll definitely be in there and ready to go."

As for his expectations for when he'll be completely ready, Yanda told me Baltimore's regular season opener at M&T on Sept. 13 against the Chiefs is a pretty safe bet.

"Baring any setbacks, I should be good," he said.