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Pete Carroll joined KIRO Radio's Dori Monson to provide a few personnel updates ahead of the Seahawks' Week 1 matchup with the Miami Dolphins this Sunday at CenturyLink Field.

The Seattle head coach first touched on rookie offensive lineman Germain Ifedi, the team's expected starter at right guard who was limited in practice on Wednesday and did not practice on Thursday because of an ankle injury.

"I'm disappointed for him because he's worked so hard and he's done so well," Carroll said. "He's really, really a good player and he's a great kid and he's really a fireball and all that. He got kicked and it just hit him just the wrong way. You would never think that he would have got hurt, but he did and he got a good little sprain, so we'll see. We don't know. We're going to take it day-to-day and see where it is, but he couldn't practice [Thursday] and we'll see where that goes.

"But as always is the case, it's not so much about the guy that got hurt, it's about the next guy coming up. We'll take care of Germain and get him back soon as we can, but we'll see how this works out as the next guys take their opportunity and jump in there. In a sense, that's another big challenge for us, do we deal with that well."

Thomas Rawls, meanwhile, missed Thursday's practice with an illness, but Carroll said the second-year running back "should be ready to play." Additionally, Carroll said the status of Jimmy Graham (knee) continues to be "day-to-day" after the tight end practiced in full on Wednesday and Thursday.

"Both guys have made extraordinary progress," Carroll said. "Thomas is a little bit ahead in that he played in the last preseason game, got a couple snaps and got on the field a few times just in preparation to see if he'd be ready for this week. It looks like he is. A little under the weather [Thursday], but he's had really great preparation getting here and should be ready to play. It's like his second preseason game, so we'd like to get him some play time and see how he fits in and how things go."

"Jimmy is a day-to-day," Carroll added. "He looks great at practice and he's again made a miraculous, marvelous comeback to get back here and to be competing like he his. We'll see what we do with that as we get to the end of the week, but really proud of these guys and really happy for them. It's such an accomplishment for those guys to get back to the playing field, so we're really proud of them."

Here's a couple more quotes from Carroll's time on KIRO Radio: 

(On the excitement heading into the regular-season opener...) "It's been a very upbeat, energetic offseason and it's really the lead coming from our players and the leadership of this team. It's just been a joy to work with these guys. They've been cranked up the whole time, we've got a lot of work done, and here we are now. We finished camp, shoot, we're winding down game week to Week 1. The energy has stayed with us throughout. We had great practices this week and nothing to think otherwise that we're going to go for it, see how far we can take this thing."

(On how good the Seahawks are this year...)"Well, we're going to find out. It doesn't matter what I think, it's what we do, but I really like our chances. I like our leadership. The core of this football team has stayed together and they've taken ownership of the leadership and I'm really fired up about the way they've embraced that. We ended on a really high note with our offense really clicking and Russell and Doug and our protection and running the football, all that stuff was really at a height and I'm hoping that we can pick up where we left off. Defensively, we have no reason to not be a good defense again. We really have basically the same guys and scheme and with a really good attitude about it. Hopefully we'll work together really well there. The kicking game is Jon Ryan, Steven Hauschka, and Tyler Lockett, so we feel very sound there and complete there. So we've got to go to work and put it together one day and one week at a time."