I’m always amazed at how often I find reporters painting an optimistic picture based on one interview or soundbite that could be taken either way. Such is the case today with Bengal’s LB Vontaze Burfict. (Side note, I love that name, he totally sounds like an awesome Muppet.) Burfict has a knee injury that sidelined him after week 8, and he missed the last nine games of the regular season as well as the one playoff loss. Originally, Burfict was reported to have undergone a knee scope, which is a nice way of saying, “knee surgery lite.” Unlike most players though, Burfict didn’t seem to respond well to the treatment. In fact, we don’t even know for sure what exact injury or condition the knee scope was supposed to address. Bengals head coach Marv Lewis has been tight-lipped at best (and perhaps deceptive at worst) this season with injury information, so he’s no help.
Given all this murkiness, I can see why reporters would be searching for answers. Here’s one tweet I read today from Cincinnati Enquirer Bengals beat reporter Paul Dehner Jr:
Guenther says he's heard that Burfict will be back and fine next year.
— Paul Dehner Jr. (@pauldehnerjr) January 5, 2015
The, “Guenther,” he references is Bengals defensive coordinator Paul Guenther. So I dig just a little to find the full interview that this story was sourced from. Sure enough, Bengals.com has a good, more in-depth piece from Geoff Hobson. In it, I find the true context. Here’s the larger quote from Hobson’s piece:
Defensive coordinator Paul Guenther has been told Pro Bowl WILL linebacker Vontaze Burfict will recover from his knee problem in time for next season. He says he’s been told Burfict is trending toward surgery to fix the knee that knocked him out of the last nine games of the season, but it hasn’t been finalized.
See the difference there? It’s not that Dehner’s take is exactly wrong. It’s just that Dehner’s angle on that makes it seem like everything is all well-and-good. The truth is that, according to Guenther, Burfict will most likely need more knee surgery. More surgery is never a good thing. It might not be a big deal, and Burfict might bounce back just fine. But, from what I read, it doesn’t sound like he’s out of the woods just yet. You’d be amazed at how often this sort of positive spin seems to come up, and I’m always happy to highlight it here and bring some gloom to the equation. Isn’t that fun?
