Quick Hits: What Justin Houston Brings, Tight End Progression + More

What Justin Houston brings

"Really excited to get Justin. And really to add to that group. That group has been really good in camp. I feel like the development of that group in camp has been outstanding and now to get to add Justin to the group is a big deal. He's a physical specimen. He's an incredibly smart football player. He's a leader. He's the ultimate competitor. I was with Justin in Indy and I was close with Justin. So this is first hand personal knowledge of a guy who he's what we're all about."

What kind of role Houston will have

"He'll be a rotational player. I have no doubt knowing him the way that I do that if we wanted to play him 60 plays a game, he'd be up for the task. But that won't be likely. It's a long season. We'll talk with Ejiro [Evero] and we'll have a plan to kind of rotate him in, get the right amount of snaps that we want for him. And ideally, you really want to be able to rotate your guys up front anyway."

Tight ends

"I love that room. I've said that from day one in the offseason. Tommy [Tremble] had a great catch out here today. Sully's looked good. Everybody looks at Ian [Thomas] as the Y blocking tight end, but he's more than that. And then of course, we got our guy [Hayden Hurst]. And so, that combination of the four is a good deal. They all have different traits. We all kind of see Hayden as the all-purpose guy, he can do everything. But they each add to the mix."

How Houston compliments Brian Burns

"Justin has great speed to power. He's got great counter moves. He can beat you multiple ways. But in this league, speed to power wins. If you want to look at sack production, you got to have a speed to power move and that's been Justin's forte his whole career. He can do that but that really compliments [Brian] Burns because Burns has that elite off the edge. And there's only a handful of guys that really have that. Brian has that. Justin compliments that on the other side with elite speed to power."

Damiere Byrd injury update

"Damiere's hamstring is pretty significant. It's going to be a while. It could require a procedure. We're continuing to get him evaluated. It's a shame because he was really looking good and obviously, he's put himself in good position. I don't want to put a timeframe on it. It's not season-ending, but it's significant. It's more than a month. It's more six, eight weeks."

You can follow us for future coverage by liking us on Facebook & following us on Twitter:

Facebook - @PanthersOnSI

Twitter - @AllPanthers_ and Schuyler Callihan at @Callihan_.