ALLEN PARK -- With training camp wrapping up last week, the Detroit Lions moved into more of a regular-season mode at practice on Monday. And they got a little healthier too.

Defensive tackle Mike Daniels and receiver Marvin Jones both were suited for the afternoon practice. Neither player made the trip to Houston last week while dealing with injuries.

Daniels is still recovering from the foot injury that cost him six games last year and forced him to undergo offseason surgery, while Jones was dealing with an undisclosed issue that held him out of practice for about a week. He was wearing a sleeve on his left arm upon his return today.

“We’ve been away for a little while, so they’ll be out there, we’ll go through it and see how they feel they’re progressing,” coach Matt Patricia said before practice. “Just got to make sure we’re not throwing them into something where it’s not going to be high of volume too soon.”

Defensive tackle Da’Shawn Hand, cornerback Teez Tabor, quarterback Tom Savage, offensive tackle Tyrell Crosby, defensive end Austin Bryant, receiver Tommylee Lewis and defensive lineman Eric Lee were among the players not practicing on Monday afternoon.

The Lions have handled their injured guys with care this offseason, with players such as Daniels, Jones, Hand, Bryant, Tabor, Savage, Trey Flowers, Snacks Harrison, Darius Slay and Jarrad Davis also missing chunks of time with injuries. Even Matthew Stafford, who says he’s completely healthy, took a week off from heavy throwing and has not played in the preseason.

But with Harrison coming off the non-football injury list last week, Flowers coming off the physically unable to perform list the week before that and now Daniels cleared for his first action since signing last month, Detroit is getting its best look yet at that highly anticipated defensive front.

“I’m always excited when guys get back out on the field” Patricia said. “That’s the best part about it, is that we can coach them up on the field in practice and try to improve. So it’ll be good. I don’t know what it’s going to look like when we get everybody out there, we’re still kind of grinding through that. But it’s realistic for us to understand those guys still have a long way to go, they’re still grinding through coming back, and making sure that we’re doing it the right way so that when they’re back on the field, we don’t have any complications going forward.”

Patricia also said he was excited to switch gears from camp mode to more of a regular-season mode, as the Lions prepare for their third exhibition -- commonly referred to as the dress rehearsal game -- on Friday night against Buffalo. Most starters are expected to play, although Patricia has declined to say whether Stafford will join them.

Detroit will even watch some tape of the Bills this week and formulate a simplistic game plan, a bit of a dry run for what Week 1 will look like against Arizona.

“It’s really a big switch for us from training camp mode, which is very much so about installation, it’s about individual improvement, things like that,” Patricia said. “But now we’ll start to get into the, how do you study an opponent? How do you study film? How do you take game tape and look at cutups? How do you take cutups earlier in the week and work them down into different situational areas of the game? And then at the end of the week, put that back together into game tape with game plan calls and communication and build that overall awareness of how to get ready to play a game? So we’ll start that process.”