damanref10
Little Lebowski Urban Achiever
I think you might be overthinking it. Players develop medical problems. You can't find me a player that's been in the league four years that doesn't have some lingering medical problem that will never be pain-free. Removing bone spurs from an ankle isn't even relevant to the discussion, IMO. It's a nothing surgery, elective. I believe they did it just because they could, as he was already in recovery for the pins he had put in his metatarsals. Sort of like if you're replacing a head gasket in your engine you might as well replace the timing belt and the water pump while the mechanic has half the engine taken apart anyway, because the additional cost is minimal and if one of them goes then they have to take half the engine apart again and the cost won't be so minimal.
The pins are there to stabilize a problem. To my knowledge, it's stabilized. Will he have pain? Yeah. But look at the guy's history. He played 15 games in 2008, 15 games in 2009, and 16 games in 2010 despite being fresh off the pin surgery and despite "reports" of him having issues in camp (we've seen those kinds of "reports" before, he put paid to them by playing 16 games). I believe the games he missed in 2007 might have been suspension-related not injury-related. He plays through pain, he deals with problems and still puts himself on the football field. That's an important quality to have, at least as important as a totally clean injury history on a 4 year veteran tailback which you're not going to find pretty much ever.
He's only had one year of carrying the load and that was last year. It's not like he carried the load once and then was never the same again. We don't know of any medical problems he's got going on this off season. He doesn't have a whole lot of tread on the tires. I think Ahmad Bradshaw is the kind of player that is poised to become a breakout player, if he's not already.
If I were the Dolphins I'd be more concerned investigating his character history than his injury history. You don't want him to become a different person when he gets money.
What up CK.
The bone spurs is a total non-issue, i totally agree. That is just a clean up procedure that goes on just about every time somebody has foot or ankle surgery.
But the history part, to your point, is the exact reason im concerned. He developed not 1, but 2 stress fractures during a year he didnt really carry the load. The doctors went so far as to tell him to change the way he ran, that his natural running motion could possibly have caused them.
He absolutely played through the pain, and thats a great quality to have. But after one year of carrying the load, (and he still conceded plenty of carries to that big waste of a lug Brandon Jacobs), he still wasnt recovered.
If i'm going to give a guy a long term lucrative deal, his injury status better look good. And it's not like we have the best doctors.....lol
Who knows as he gets older and more carries how the feet act. Just my worry