Everything that I’m about to say here shouldn’t really have to be said. But since we’re less than a week away from the NFL Draft, many people seem to prefer hype to reality. As usual, this is my chance to be a total buzzkill and bring everyone back to Earth. People love it when I do that.
The best example for today’s rant is Notre Dame LB Jaylon Smith. Smith was once in position to be a slam-dunk first round draft pick, with a good chance to be within the first 10 players to come off the board. But in the Fiesta Bowl on January 1st, Smith tore his ACL and LCL. That’s not a good combo, but it’s not exactly a death-sentence either. If Smith’s injury was limited to just those two ligaments, then his biggest obstacle might’ve simply been time, as he was unlucky to get injured so late in the season and so close to the NFL Combine. But the bigger concern now is that Smith is still dealing with nerve damage in his injured knee, and therefore cannot lift the front of his foot.
Smith’s medical team has mostly tried to downplay his nerve injury, but I’m here to tell you that nerve damage is an entirely different kettle of fish than many NFL injuries. When a bone breaks, there is generally clearly defined progress in the healing process. It’s broken, it’s healing, it’s still healing, and eventually it’s healed. Sure, there can be setbacks such as infections or later fractures if the bone is stressed again. But the healing process here is mostly a straight line. Muscle and ligament injuries such as strains and sprains are less linear, but will still frequently follow a general forward progression. But nerve injuries, no, not so much. Basically nerve damage is a just a huge question mark. Perhaps the nerve will heal on its own and sensation will return. Perhaps surgery will be needed to help this process along. But really, all bets are generally off when it comes to reliable, predictable timetables. (Note, there are timetables about nerve healing, I’m just saying that nerve injuries often vary significantly from those predictions).
For comparison, anyone remember Peyton Manning’s nerve saga? It took Manning one year, somewhere between two and four surgeries (depending on who you believe) and multiple (usually reported as four) trips to Europe for experimental procedures. And while you could view Manning as an example of a success, one could easily argue that his was a qualified success at best. Even years later, Manning was still affected by the injury, but his experience and his position allowed him to compensate in order to stay on the field. A rookie like Jaylon Smith is less likely to be able to do the same should he return at less than 100%.
I started this rambling post though to get to one point. When Smith’s medical team (in this example, Dr. Dan Cooper) says something like:
He has a very good chance of getting his nerve recovery back.
Then it’s important that we acknowledge that a different way of phrasing the exact same idea would be:
He has a chance of never getting his nerve recovery back.
In defense of Smith’s doctor, he went on to give a lot of very specific medical information that backed up his optimism, and you can read that here in this USA Today piece. Also, reporter Tom Pelissero did a great job breaking things down there and pointing out that there are no guarantees here, so I have no beef with him. My issue is that, when reduced to a blurb, this story simply gets spun as, “Smith should be fine, eventually.” In reality, we have no way of knowing that he will be fine, and we have no way of knowing exactly what timeframe he might be looking at. Given all those unknowns, I find myself frustrated to read that Smith might be a great mid- to late-round steal should he bounce back. I mean, I get it, but my point is simply that his risk is high, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves by assuming that he’ll be fine after a rookie redshirt season.
