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Danny O'Neil covers the Seahawks for The Seattle Times.

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April 7, 2009 1:54 PM

Linebacker Leroy Hill skips voluntary camp

Linebacker Leroy Hill, who has been designated Seattle's franchise player, did not attend the first day of a three-day voluntary minicamp.

Hill has been designated Seattle's franchise player, which entails a one-year qualifying offer of $8.3 million for 2009. Hill chose not to attend the camp, though.

Coach Jim Mora was asked if he hoped to have Hill participating.

"I certainly was hoping he would be," Mora said. "I did not expect him to be. We would like him to be here. We would like for him to be getting this work. It's hard to ever duplicate the things we're doing here, the first steps of the process, but that's a business decision that he made and I respect that. But I certainly would have liked him to be here."

Hill would have had the option of signing the qualifying offer and attending or signing a waiver and participating in the practice.

Hill previously said he took the decision to designate him a franchise player as a compliment, and Mora was clear to state that there is no hostility in the current standoff.

"It's not an acrimonious thing," Mora said. "It's a business thing. There's no bitterness. There's no back-and-forth. It's all very positive. He just made a business decision."

There were 11 other players who were held out of Tuesday's practice because of health issues. Wide receiver Deion Branch was among those. He had an arthroscopic procedure to clean up the knee he had operated on after the 2007 season.

"Nothing serious," Mora said.

The hope is Branch will be ready for the team's June minicamp.

The other 10 players who did not participate: K Brandon Coutu, WR Michael Bumpus (broken bone in foot), CB Kelly Jennings, CB DeMichael Dizer, LB D.D.Lewis, G Mike Wahle (shoulder), T Walter Jones (knee), DT/DE Cory Redding, DE Patrick Kerney (shoulder), DE Brandon Miller.

"We're taking a cautious approach with any of those guys that are close," Mora said. "We want to get those guys healthy before we push them out on the field."

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