After starting every game for seven consecutive years, Bengals right tackle Willie Anderson missed most of last season with heel and knee injuries.

Today Anderson was finally back and ready to go at the Bengals’ organized team activity, but he appears to have lost his spot in the starting lineup to Stacy Andrews.

“It’s going to be an up-in-the-air decision,” Anderson said of whether he would start. “It’s in my mind right now that Stacy is going to be in the first group. We’ll see what happens.”

Andrews signed the one-year tender offer as the Bengals’ franchise player, and it wouldn’t make much sense for the team to give him a guaranteed $7.455 million salary if they didn’t expect him to start.

That means the soon-to-be 33-year-old Anderson, who had been to four straight Pro Bowls before his injury-plagued 2007, is likely to be a backup — or not on the team at all.

And that means that while Bengals coach Marvin Lewis say he’s thrilled to have Anderson back, the five-year, $32 million contract extension the team gave Anderson two years ago is no longer looking like a good deal.