Victor Cruz, who is bouncing back from a patellar tendon tear, believes that he will be available to play in Week 1, NFL.com reports.

Cruz, who is bouncing back from a patellar tendon tear, believes that he will be available to play in Week 1, NFL.com reports.

Analysis:

At this stage, Cruz isn't cutting on his knee just yet, but he has been running in a straight line for about a month now, which lends some plausibility to his optimism on that front. With that in mind, Cruz notes, "there's zero doubts that I'll be playing in that first game." Such a notion is echoed by GM Jerry Reese, who indicated Thursday that Cruz has "looked good, he's running pretty good, right now and he's scheduled to be back ready for the opener for us." That said, Reese cautioned, "until you get out there and turn it loose, you never know what a guy is going to do. But he looks great right now." With Odell Beckham Jr. and Rueben Randle also in the team's wideout mix, the Giants can probably afford to ease Cruz back in, but either way, it's encouraging to see Cruz heading in the right direction in the wake of the serious knee injury that he sustained in Week 6 of the 2014 season.