Read More: John Abraham (DE – ATL), Justin Blalock (G – ATL), Brent Grimes (CB – ATL), Kelvin Hayden (CB – ATL), Sam Baker (OT – ATL), Curtis Lofton (LB – ATL), William Moore (S – ATL), Vance Walker (DT – ATL), Corey Peters (DT – ATL), Julio Jones (WR – ATL), Atlanta Falcons, Minnesota Vikings

Earlier on Friday it was reported that Atlanta Falcons wide receiver Julio Jones would play on Sunday against the Minnesota Vikings, and Jones backed that up by fully participating in Friday’s practice. This was his first full practice this week and the hope is that Jones is fully recovered from the hamstring that has bothered Jones for the past two months and caused him to miss last weeks game against the Tennessee Titans.

Defensive tackle Vance Walker made an appearance on the injury report for the first time this week and cornerback Kelvin Hayden has officially been ruled out. Offensive tackle Sam Barker who has missed time with a back injury was able to fully participate in Friday’s practice, but he is still listed as questionable.

Here’s the full Falcons practice and injury report for Week 12: 

DID NOT PARTICIPATE: Cornerback Kelvin Hayden (groin, out) and cornerback Brent Grimes (knee, questionable)

LIMITED PARTICIPATION: Defensive tackle Vance Walker (groin, questionable).

FULL PARTICIPATION: Wide receiver Julio Jones (hamstring, probable), safety William Moore (quadricep, probable), defensive end John Abraham (not injury-related, probable), guard Justin Blalock (ankle, probable), tight end Tony Gonzalez (not injury-related, probable), defensive tackle Corey Peters (knee, probable), linebacker Curtis Lofton (ankle, probable) and offensive tackle Sam Baker (back, questionable)

For more on the Falcons, head to The Falcoholic; for more on the Vikings, visit Daily Norseman.

The Miami Dolphins will begin their preseason schedule on Friday night in Atlanta, at the Georgia Dome, against the Falcons. It is a “game” by the definition of the word. The score will be kept. Statistics will be recorded.

But the Dolphins aren’t really treating this as a game.

Miami coach Tony Sparano has said on multiple occasions this week that the meeting against the Falcons will allow him and his staff another practice opportunity. That’d be the case for a preseason game in any year. It’s especially true now, though, given all that was lost – mini-camps, off-season team activities, meetings – that were lost to the NFL lockout.

Ordinarily, the Dolphins would be much farther along with their offensive installation. They would have been working with draftees for months, instead of weeks. They would have signed undrafted rookies after the draft in April, instead of signing them days before the start of training camp.

The lockout left all of the NFL’s 32 teams in scramble mode but the Dolphins, perhaps, were among those teams that have had to scramble the most. It’s one thing for, say, the Patriots to rush through a preseason. After all, New England has used the same system for a while now. The players know what to expect. They know how to make it work.

It’s another thing, though, for the Dolphins to rush through the preseason. Offensive coordinator Brian Daboll has had to condense his offensive installation process into a manageable package that can fit into the small space between the start of camp and the beginning of the regular season. The offensive playbook, thicker than a hardcover dictionary, has had to be cut.

The Dolphins won’t know all of it by the start of the season. Not even close.

So while you might be anxious to see what the Dolphins look like on Friday night, Sparano and his staff are even more anxious. They want to see how certain players – especially the younger, more inexperienced ones – react in certain situations. They want to see how the team to this point has grasped the parts of the playbook that have been installed (and while Miami won’t come close to going through the whole playbook before the start of the season, a lot has already been installed).

Sparano was asked after practice on Wednesday how many series the starters would play.

“Not many,” he said. “I mean, we’ll get them out there, they’ll play, there’s a few guys that may not play, but for the most part most guys will play but just not [much]. I can’t afford it. I have no gauge on how many plays we’re going to play.

“So in other words I don’t know that our offense isn’t going to be out there for 40 plays and our defense out there for 70 or vice versa. So with that in mind I can’t afford to keep a group out there too long without getting some of these young players evaluated.

“I need to make sure these players get evaluated because as we get going here into the next couple weeks I really can’t waste that kind of time.”

Sparano said he the Dolphins wouldn’t do any game-planning for Atlanta. And he didn’t dismiss the possibility of communicating with the Falcons staff and figuring out a way to make this game mutually beneficial for both teams by making it more of a practice opportunity.

“I have done it before in some situations. In fact going into the Dallas [preseason] game last year [Cowboys coach Jason Garrett] and I talked. There are sometimes where you communicate with the other coach and there’s so some things you really want to get work on, maybe things that you really need to see.

“Might be a special team thing where you want to see some rush. Might be a little bit more pressure, one way or the other. If you have a relationship with that coach, that other head coach, you might be able to do that. I think Jason [Garrett] and John [Fox] have that kind of relationship. So as we get on in this thing here and start with these preseason games that would be something I would strongly consider just because you’ve lost practices.

“You wouldn’t under normal circumstances do that but because you’ve lost practices there might be something that they need or you need and there is a little bit of a trade off there.”

So it’s possible that while Miami and Atlanta are competing against one another on Friday night, that they’ll actually be working together some, too. Just another twist in a strange, long lead-up to the 2011 NFL season.