Tank Dells difficult road to recovery has been laid bare after the Houston Texans wide receiver suffered a career threatening injury on Saturday.
In the third quarter of Houstons 27-19 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs, Dell collided with teammate Jared Wayne while making a touchdown catch in the back of the endzone. Speaking to reporters on Monday, Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans revealed that the 25-year-old sustained a dislocated knee cap and a torn ACL, in addition to some other thing there that hell have to get repaired.
According to league sources, Dell tore his medial collateral and lateral collateral ligaments, as well as suffered damage to his meniscus. Given the severity of the injury and timing of when it happened, orthopedic surgeon David Chao told KPRC 2 that theres a chance he may never play in the NFL again.
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This is a much more difficult recovery than just an ACL, its a knee dislocation with three of four major ligaments torn and its a long road back, said Chao, who previously served as an NFL team head doctor for 17 years. Unfortunately, it has to be considered career threatening, but we all hope not career-ending.
“Surgery is usually staged with this severe an injury. Whatever you can repair, you repair now, the MCL and LCL. The ACL is typically a reconstruction and you delay that until later when swelling goes down and theres more mobility.
Though Dell remains a longshot to play for the Texans next season, Chao noted that it is possible. For evidence, he cited Cleveland Browns running back Nick Chubb, who returned to the field in October following a significant knee injury he suffered just under 57 weeks prior.
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A typical recovery timetable, it would be great if he could participate at some point next season, but its far from guaranteed he will play at any point next season. Its similar to what happened with Browns running back Nick Chubb, Chao said. Theyre both knee dislocations, but not all knee dislocations are the same. This is a much more complicated surgery process than an isolated ACL and, as such, its going to be multiple surgeries and lots of follow-up.
As much as this is a devastating injury, Nick Chubb did return to play his next season. Lets hope for a similar good outcome for Tank Dell.
On Monday, Ryans stopped short of confirming whether Dell will be able to suit up for the Texans in the 2025-26 campaign – insisting that his status for next year is the least of their worries at this time.
Right now, the focus is just on Tank, just going through this process, getting the surgery, getting recovered, well deal with that when it comes, Ryans said. I dont think its the time right now to discuss whats going to happen next season with Tank, just allow him to get this time to heal up and recover.
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