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Injuries have been the major story of the National Football League preseason. Green Bay’s Jordy Nelson and Carolina’s Kelvin Benjamin have both been lost for the season to ACL injuries.
It has become so distressing that some observers are calling for reduction of preseason games as a way to prevent injuries. But reducing the number of preseason games from four, to two, doesn’t really solve any problems.
Because of the very nature of the sport, and the sheer size, speed and strength of the players, injuries are going to occur. What we are seeing now is not a rash of injuries, but simply the way things are in the sport of football.
People are going to get hurt. You just hope and pray it is not serious, and you hope that it is not your star player.
Really, the only sure way to make sure a guy doesn’t go down is to not practice him, and not play him. So, what good is that?
There are ways to at least try and protect players. In Detroit, Calvin Johnson gets the ‘Barry Sanders’ treatment. Megatron has not played a down heading into Friday’s third exhibition game against Jacksonville. And Lions coach Jim Caldwell said there is a very good chance that he might not play at all.
Legend has it that back in the day Lions coach Wayne Fontes would gather the team around on the practice field, and then point to Barry Sanders. “You see this guy, No. 20? Don’t touch him, or you will be on the next bus outta here.”
Of course, you wonder if anyone could ever tackle Sanders even if they tried. Fontes did as good a job protecting Sanders as one possibly can in practice, and games. In actual games Fontes picked his spots, using Sanders in short yardage and goal line situations.
Of course, Sanders rarely took hard hits anyway because he was so elusive, which also helps. And while keeping him out of goal line situations hurt his touchdown totals (as if 99 career TDs is a bad thing), Sanders’ never wore down. He actually got faster as he got older.
So, when you already know what proven stars like Sanders and Johnson, can do, why risk injury? That is especially the case with a player such as Johnson, who receives so much punishment
At the end of the day, it is fate. Sanders could have easily blown his knee out in practice, as well as Johnson. Nelson’s injury came without contact. He could have been playing two-hand touch, and he was still going down.
All you can really do is hope that luck is on your side.
All a player can do is train and prepare himself the best way his can. And then hope nothing bad happens.
