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It’s unfortunate, and it’s not like the players want this to happen, but sometimes it just keeps happening over and over to certain individuals.
Dee Milliner and Dexter McDougle can’t catch a break. Both are hurt again.
If you are going to pick players who had myriad injury issues in college, it’s best to take a flyer on them in the late rounds, not the early rounds.
While I mentioned the other day some of the good things John Idzik did as Jets GM, a big mistake he made, hitching his wagon to second-round quarterback. Another was picking, not one, but two injury-prone corners high in the draft – Dee Milliner in the first round of the 2013 draft, and Dexter McDougle in the third round of the 2014 draft.
Both players have had a hard time staying healthy in college, and the problem has followed both to the NFL.
Neither players practiced today. Milliner has a hamstring injury, and McDougle has an ankle problem.
This summer Milliner broke his wrist, and McDougle suffered a hand injury, and Dexter has played for about the last two month with a brace on his left hand. As I had mentioned on a few occasions, it was hurting him as a gunner on special teams – getting off blocks and tackling.
Now each of them as a new injury.
And remember, when the Jets picked each player, they were both in the middle of rehab. So it’s not like they had been injured, but were picked healthy. Neither was picked healthy.
Milliner’s five surgeries in college are well-documented. When he was picked by the Jets, he was in the middle of recovery from a shoulder surgery for a torn labrum.
Jets Confidential broke a pretty significant story last year that has received little attention, but it was a very big deal. We aren’t looking for attention, but just trying to point out the significance of this story. According to a source close to the team, Idzik ignored the doctors’ advice on Milliner. According to the source, the medical people didn’t check off on the pick, but Idzik made the selection anyway. Perhaps following the terrible PR following the Darrelle Revis trade, he felt the need to pick a corner.
As for McDougle, he had major shoulder surgery at Maryland, and we mean major, and when he got to the Jets, he still wasn’t close to being 100 percent. Due to the medical risk, not many teams had a third-round grade on him. He was considered more of a 5th-7th type prospect.
Dennis Thurman pounded the table for him.
Hey it’s fine that Thurman liked his tape, but the brass shouldn’t said, “fine, but due to the medical situation, we can’t give him a third-round grade.”
So now, those two examples of medical dice rolling have come back to bite the Jets.
I will give you a perfect example of how to handle prospects with medical concerns – Trevor Reilly.
Reilly was considered a 4th-5th round type prospect out of Utah, but hurt his knee late in his career at Utah, and this made teams stay away in the middle rounds, and the Jets pulled the trigger in the seventh round. Perfect spot, and it’s worked out well for the Jets. And you know what, if it didn’t, not a big deal – it was only a seventh round pick.
December 24, 2015
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