New York Giants head coach John Harbaugh is encouraged by the progress of Malik Nabers as the star wide receiver continues to work his way back from last year’s season-ending knee injury.

“He’s making really good progress right now. I’m very hopeful that he’ll be back soon,” Harbaugh told reporters on Wednesday.

“Also, understand when you come back from a knee, he’ll be back, and he’ll still be building his way back to his ultimate full-strength self.”

After a Pro Bowl campaign as a 2024 rookie, Nabers sustained a torn right anterior cruciate ligament in Week 4 last fall that ended his season.

“He’s probably maybe 70% through. I don’t know, something like that, 80% through,” Harbaugh said of Nabers’ recovery. “He’s still grinding. It’s going to be a grind when he starts playing again, too, to get back right.”

Nabers, 22, was limited to 18 receptions for 271 yards and two TDs last season after a stellar debut campaign in 2024. He had 109 catches for 1,204 yards and seven scores.

The Giants selected Nabers with the sixth overall pick of the 2024 NFL Draft out of LSU.

–Field Level Media

Collin Morikawa is feeling relaxed — if not exactly well-rested — as he competes at the RBC Canadian Open following a four-week absence from the PGA Tour.

Morikawa, 29, has not played since a T55 finish at the PGA Championship while dealing with a nagging back injury and also becoming a first-time father.

“Just a different perspective on life, I think. I’m just enjoying every day. I can stare at a camera, I can stare at my little one just non-stop and kind of forget about what else is going on,” the World No. 10 told reporters Wednesday at TPC Toronto at Osprey Valley in Caledon, Ontario.

“I know at the same time I still have a job to do when I’m out here and that’s what’s great kind of being back. But at the same time when I’m out there playing you’re kind of playing a little bit differently, your mind’s in a different spot. I think I’m a lot more positive out there and hopefully I can kind of just allow my body to relax and go out and play golf and enjoy it again.”

Morikawa has received “new dad” tips from many of his friends on the PGA Tour but said the “sleep thing” still got to him and his wife, Katherine Zhu.

“That’s a real thing,” he said. “So, I won’t push it on my wife that I’m getting some great sleep out here. But your body gets used to taking 50-minute naps and learning how to run off that.”

Morikawa won the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am in February and has four other top-10 finishes this season, including a T7 at the Masters.

The two-time major winner’s back injury first flared up during a practice swing at The Players Championship in March, which forced him to withdraw.

“I left the PGA Championship uncomfortable in a way,” he said. “I’ve been grinding this kind of back injury since The Players. It still hadn’t felt that comfortable. So it was nice to take a full reset. And just focus on other things going on in life. I think after that I’ve just been able to relax a little bit more.

“There’s still a trust factor that I’m looking for that I’m trying to find this week, I think, going into tomorrow and into next week (the U.S. Open) essentially. But it’s a lot better of a swing than I’ve been putting on and that’s for me a positive thing.

“I think when the body fully is able to kind of have that last little puzzle piece of fully relaxing, I think the game’s going to be exactly how I want. I still feel like I’m hit great shots when I need to. But just the consistency-wise I think if I can build that into this week it will be a great boost into next week.”

Morikawa is competing in the RBC Canadian Open for the first time since making his professional debut at the event in 2019, when he tied for 14th.

–Field Level Media

Lance Rentzel, who made headlines on and off he field during his nine NFL seasons, has died.

Media reports said he died Sunday in Alexandria, Va., with no cause of death revealed.

Rentzel was a second-round pick of the Minnesota Vikings out of Oklahoma in 1965. He made his way into the franchise record books as a rookie when he returned a kickoff 101 yards, a record that lasted until 2007.

The Vikings traded Rentzel to the Dallas Cowboys in 1967 after two injury-hampered seasons and an off-field issue, and he immediately became a key player in the Tom Landry offense. He gained more than 950 yards in each of his first three seasons in Dallas, playing in all 14 games each year. And in 1969, he led the NFL with 12 touchdown receptions and an average of 22.3 yards per catch.

With the Cowboys, he also caught a touchdown pass from Dan Reeves in the “Ice Bowl” against the Green Bay Packers in 1967.

His career in Dallas ended in 1970 after his arrest on charges of exposing himself to a young girl — repeating an allegation from an incident in Minnesota in 1966. In the 1970 incident, he received a three-year suspended sentence after entering a guilty plea and was put on probation. In the 1966 case, the judge ordered psychiatric care.

Following the 1970 arrest, Rentzel was traded to the Los Angeles Rams, and his wife — singer and actress Joey Heatherton — divorced him to end their brief marriage.

He played three seasons with the Rams between 1971 and 1974. The NFL suspended him indefinitely — it lasted the 1973 season — after his conviction for possession of marijuana.

In his career, Rentzel made 268 receptions for 4,826 yards, averaging 18 yards per catch, in 115 games (84 starts). He hauled in 38 touchdowns, ran for two more and returned 32 kckoffs for 783 yards.

–Field Level Media