RIVER FALLS, Wis. — Once the trauma of his latest football injury took time to sink in—and he assures it could be measured in moments — Brodie Croyle began to assess his playing future.

He quickly came to one determination: Other people might write the obituary for his Chiefs’ and maybe even his quarterbacking career, but he wasn’t going to do it himself.

“I just knew that’s not the way I wanted to go out,” Croyle said of the season-ending knee injury he suffered in last October’s game against Tennessee. “I didn’t want that to be my final legacy, my final play in the NFL.

“I still love the game. I don’t think anybody was more excited to come to training camp than I was. I actually get to play football again. I’ve done all the rehab and all the working out to give myself a chance, so it’s fun to get back there.”

Croyle, after missing all the offseason practices because he was rehabilitating from knee surgery, returned to play when the Chiefs started training camp two weeks ago. Croyle, a former starter, is competing for a backup spot behind Matt Cassel.

“I think for the first couple of days, it was tough for him to get back into the mode of practicing, but then he picked it up in day three or four,” Chiefs coach Todd Haley said. “I think he’s making progress, but missing (the offseason practices) was definitely tough.

“A lot of it was just rust. He’s got a couple of things to deal with: getting confidence back that his knee is OK, for one. If you’ve had that injury, there’s a mental side you have to overcome. But really it’s just rust, not getting the team in and out of the huddle, being slow, calling it wrong at the line of scrimmage, different things. Then not getting the ball out as quick as we’d like it to come out, but again, he’s picked it up since then and made positive progress.”

Croyle already emerged victorious in one battle, the race to return by the start of training camp. Last year, he not only tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee for the second time but also damaged his medial collateral ligament.

“It’s been a long road,” he said. “It’s probably a little earlier than people thought right off the bat. It was a pretty good knee injury. A lot of rehab, a lot of extra work. It was my goal to get back by the start of camp so I could give myself a chance and I would have to play well when I got here.”

It was yet another in a series of injuries that include a separated shoulder in last season’s opener in New England.

“I knew right away,” Croyle said. “As soon as it happened, it was just one of those ‘I cannot believe this is happening’ moments. I had the separated shoulder, and I had just got back out there and was playing well. Then, just like that ...

“It seems like I’ve had a streak of those moments put together here. You just keep plugging along.”

He had moments early in camp where the strength of his surgically repaired knee was tested. He passed that one.

“When you have an injury like mine, it kind of takes you a little bit to get going,” Croyle said. “You’ve got to have that moment that lets you know you can do it again. The first day out there I felt like I was trying to protect it. Then the first play of the practice the next day, I had a guy whip-leg right into my knee. That let me know it’s going to be OK.”

Then there was the quarterbacking part. Haley was critical of Croyle on the field early in camp, but those comments have slowed as Croyle settled back into his routine.

“The first day, it just felt like bodies were flying around everywhere, guys in coverage everywhere,” Croyle said. “It takes awhile to get used to seeing everything, anticipating your throws, anticipating the holes. I wouldn’t say it’s completely back, but each practice it’s feeling better and better.”