The two oldest listed Bulldogs, who will turn 34 and 32 respectively this month, will be sidelined for at least the club's pool match competition with Geelong and North Melbourne on February 20.
"We'll gradually put [Hudson and Hall] in, maybe in week two or week three. We might even leave it until week three," coach Rodney Eade told 3AW's Sports Today on Monday night.
"The other guys, like [Robert] Murphy, [Lindsay] Gilbee, [Daniel] Giansiracusa, [Matthew] Boyd and [Daniel] Cross, how many games they get and whether they get four or two or three … we'll work that out over the next few weeks."
Hall and Hudson will join Brian Lake, Ryan Hargrave, Adam Cooney, Ben Hudson and Barry Hall as players who will miss at least the pre-season opener.
Eade said there will definitely be at least five players absent from the Skilled Stadium hit out and possibly another "two, three or four".
Lake is recovering from knee, hip and shoulder surgery while Hargrave is on the mend after a foot operation. Cooney is improving following a hamstring complaint.
In better news for the club, 2007 NAB AFL Rising Star nominee Shaun Higgins has enjoyed a stellar summer on the track and has improved his running to compete with the top athletes at Whitten Oval.
"His pre-season has been really good. He had a really good run into 2009 and then unfortunately he got a bit of OP (osteitis pubis)," Eade said.
"He had a bit of a back spasm a couple of weeks ago and missed two or three days but most players, if you're pushing them to the limit, are going to have some sort of niggle over the pre-season.
"He's performed well in scratch matches we've had at training."
The Bulldogs have introduced full competitive work into their training regime as they prepare for the NAB Cup, which they claimed over St Kilda almost 12 months ago.
"We don't do a lot each session; maybe two 15-minute halves that are full on and then we might do some other tackling or marking work that is fully contested," Eade said.
"We'll just build that up over the next few weeks as well."
