McCarthy: 'Glad Nelson will be here for a long time'

Packers coach Mike McCarthy spoke to the media following Saturday's first practice of training camp. Here are some highlights:

On Jordy Nelson extension:

Jordy Nelson is an outstanding football player and great ambassador for the Packers. It's something everybody is excited about. I'm glad to see Jordy will be here for some time. Just made aware of it. I think Jordy is so consistent and shows up each day and performs at a high level. He's the ultimate pro.

Good to get it out of the way?

Those are business affairs. Any type of distraction every training camp and season, distractions are coming. If you can avoid them, it's definitely a good thing for your team.

Consistency with Nelson a factor:

Jordy was the same in the offseason program. If you look at practice today. There were good components of the team work. I thought Jordy had a heck of the day particularly down the middle.

On Randall Cobb's status:

Every coach wants his core guys. No doubt. If I was responsible for player check book, we'd be over budget long ago. Randall is an excellent player. You always want to see if your guys get paid.

On Perry, Neal and Worthy:

Nick Perry and Mike Neal are close based off exams. Jerel Worthy is going to be some time. Neal is core injury. Perry is foot and knee injury. Guion is hamstring. Janis is illness. Worthy is lower back. Being smart with Clay Matthews.

On Eddie Lacy:

I think Eddie Lacy is more polished and more comfortable. Extremely productive runner. As far as pass pro and recognition, check downs route running. He had some nice catches today.

On TJ Lang/Barclay playing in place:

Just being smart. Participant in practice. Barclay plays any position. He played some center. Don is a guy you don't want to compete against. He'll be each day.

On challenges of public practice:

You have to go through your installs. You can't get away from that. You aren't going to practice behind doors all the time. We have two practices we lock in on.

On conditioning:

Conditioning test was fine. Nothing negative to report out of it. Veteran players know they need more if not getting enough work in practice.

On JC Tretter building chemistry with guards in run game:

He was here last year. Did a good job from mental standpoint. It's like anything. You have a system of football. He's detailed and sharp. Consistent in approach. He has two outstanding guards next to him that have been through battles.

On DuJuan Harris:

Solid. I've seen him do some good things. I thought in offseason physically it looks like he's back. Needs to tighten it down, the little things.

On PUP players catching up:

It's a different mountain. Four are technically a Saturday practice, which is limited. It's an in-season Friday. It's really 17 practices with two in shells. You have 15 padded practices. That's the emphasis and urgency.

On getting Matthews and Peppers both on the field:

It's a focus. They're obviously two impactful players. You want them on the field as much as possible. We're not going to build defense on just 11 players. Looking for more involvement

Message to team:

Make-up of the team is different. The emphasis of what you need to improve on. I don't really want to get into it.

On value of moving Matthews around:

He's an impact player. Anytime you go offense, defense, special teams. You have an impact player, you want to create targeting problems. That's why we did it.