GREEN BAY — It was a strange sight Wednesday night: A.J. Hawk on the sideline, not practicing.

The Green Bay Packers' third-year lineback suffered what coach Mike McCarthy termed "a chest injury" in Monday night's preseason-opening loss to the Cincinnati Bengals. Hawk not only sat out Wednesday night's practice — believed to be the first time he's missed a practice since entering the league — but McCarthy ruled Hawk out for Saturday night's game at San Francisco as well.

"He will not be available this week," McCarthy said. Asked if Hawk could play if it were a regular-season game, McCarthy replied, "I don't know. I would say not."

McCarthy said the injury occurred when Hawk broke up a third-down pass to tight end Ben Utecht on the Bengals' third series. Hawk didn't leave the game because of the injury.

On guard

While rookie fourth-round pick Josh Sitton was far from perfect in his first NFL game Monday night, he apparently was good enough to keep his spot with the No. 1 offensive line.

With center Scott Wells returning to practice for the first time since suffering a back injury, Sitton remained at right guard with the first-string while Jason Spitz shifted from center to left guard. Spitz opened camp as the starting right guard but moved to center after Wells went down.

Allen Barbre and Daryn Colledge had been alternating at left guard throughout the offseason and first two weeks of camp, but it appears Spitz and Sitton have the inside track on the two starting spots. Junius Coston remains on the periphery of the battle.

"Really, you've got five guys competing for three positions in there," McCarthy said. "We're going to try to keep Sitton at right guard, like to keep Allen at left guard, and the other three obviously have flexibility."

While offensive coordinator Joe Philbin acknowledged that Sitton struggled at times in Monday night's game, the coaches feel they can let the guard competition continue, unlike in 2006, when they wanted to establish starters early in camp.

"You look back two years ago and that was a little different situation. There was a sense of urgency just to get those guys ready to play," Philbin said. "We have a little more time to see how this unfolds. We've got to let these guys play some football."

Not kicking himself

While Mike Stock certainly wasn't thrilled with Jon Ryan's 14- and 15-yard punts in Monday night's game, the Green Bay Packers special teams coordinator isn't overly concerned about the punting situation — and isn't chalking up Ryan's inconsistency in the game to a lack of competition in camp.

"Listen, there's competition," Stock said. "There may not be anybody here, but there are a bunch of guys not in the league or on teams that have two punters in camp. The NFL is `Not For Long.' There's no comfort zone."

Stock likened Ryan's 15-yard shank to not swinging through a short iron shot in golf — "You decelerate, and you shank the ball; it's the same with punts," Stock said — and said the 14-yarder was caused by a protection breakdown to Ryan's left. On his other five punts, Ryan averaged 46.0 gross yards per punt and 38.0 net yards per punt. With the two short punts, his averages were 37.0 gross and 31.3 net.

On the other end of punts, Stock said he liked what he saw from Will Blackmon, who figures to keep the job if he can stay healthy, as well as rookie Jordy Nelson.

Thompson moving on

General manager Ted Thompson is happy to be focusing on football and not the all-consuming Brett Favre situation anymore.

"I don't know if relief is the right word, but it's good to get back to football and be able to think about emergency lists and advance scouting and college scouting and doing our day-to-day job," Thompson said.

Asked if there was any criticism that he thought was unfair, Thompson replied, "Everyone has their own take on this. I think you could call people in Russia and they would give you an opinion on this one. There is not much that you can do about that. I think you try to just do your job every day and be able to look at yourself in the mirror at night."

Extra points

McCarthy acknowledged that the battle between Brian Brohm and Matt Flynn for the backup quarterback job is on. "I think Matt's definitely closing the gap, there's no doubt about it," McCarthy said. "I think he's really been pushing Brian here probably about the last eight to 10 days." ... Pass-rushing defensive end Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila's arthroscopically repaired knee is still bothering him, but Thompson said the club isn't overly concerned with the practice time he has missed. "We kind of know what Kabeer brings to the table," Thompson said. "We don't feel like we need to rush him." ... Thompson said defensive tackle Justin Harrell (back) is "making progress."