Another week of preseason football down, another week of major injuries to report! These injuries are not bumps, bruises, scrapes that an athlete would sustain over the course of playing football. These injuries continue to be severe, career altering, and out of control. If you would like to review the injuries from this preseason, please read Part I and Part II. Right now, there are 170 significant injuries that have forced players to either be injured enough to be injured/waived, miss extended time, or season ending.
Digging into this week’s preseason injuries, 23 players have been added to the IR or expected to miss extended time. Most of the injuries reported this week occurred during preseason games. ACL tears this preseason alone continue to skyrocket at an alarming rate, currently at 26 players. WR Julian Edelman (Patriots), LS Patrick Scales (Bears), WR Cameron Meredith (Bears), DE Matthew Godin (Texans) and LB Albert McClellan (Ravens) all ended their respective seasons in preseason Week 3 contest with the exception of McClellan going down in practice on Friday. McClellan and Edelman’s injuries were non-contact tears and Meredith, Scales, and Godin tore during contact plays. Special note, there have now been 2 long snappers that have gone down for the season due to ACL tears. This is concerning as long snapper is a lesser known, but vital position to every NFL club.
Other significant injuries to note are LCL/PCL tears, fibula and foot fractures, quadriceps tears, and tibial plateau fractures. The other 13 injuries consisted of undisclosed/unknown or various sprains. Once again, injuries are expected to occur, but the severity is what is most concerning. There have been studies that analyze adjusted games lost compared to win totals. Some of the least injured teams still missed the playoffs, yet teams that lose more players to injury still make the post season often and go deep frequently. Football Outsiders did a fantastic job analyzing these trends with reports going back several years. I would like to note that the adjusted games lost does not equate to specific win totals, but may indicate how crucial depth is towards overall success.
Breaking down which teams got hit the hardest by injury include: Bears & Cowboys with 3 each followed by Giants, Jets, and Patriots with 2 each. It appears the Bears have been hit the hardest, sustaining 2 ACL tears along with another player requiring wrist surgery, missing extended time. The Patriots continue to be hit hard, losing players in back to back weeks with season ending injuries. No team is immune to this, but some are clearly more fortunate than others.
Once again, the Bills for the most part escape without any season ending injuries. It was reported that both Tyrod Taylor and T.J. Yates both sustained concussions and are currently in the league’s concussion protocol. This leaves Nathan Peterman as the only healthy QB on the roster at the moment. The Bills did sign QB Keith Wenning who is familiar with OC Rick Dennison’s offense, but don’t expect him to stick around once Taylor and Yates are cleared to play. Besides the two concussions which hopefully won’t keep either out for long, the Bills continue to maintain a relatively injury free preseason. How this will translate to regular season games is anybody’s guess, but having a healthy team with depth is one step towards long term improvement.
Finally, the preseason end is near! The Bills wrap up the preseason with the Lions coming to New Era Field in a Thursday night match up. This will allow the coaching staff to address some of the problems including O-line play, penalties, and scoring. As a fan, therapist, and writer; I pray that the Bills get through this game without major injury going into the Jets game with the best roster possible. As the Jets have been touted as one of the worst teams this season, I do not expect them to roll over, especially Week 1. Expect a tough, grind it out game for the early part, with the expectation that the Bills pull away due to the increased talent on their roster. Look for Preseason Injury Breakdown Part IV coming up after the Lions game. If there are any specific injuries or players you have questions about, feel free to contact me.
