What is really going on with the Buccaneers and Ryan Jensen
By Rob Leeds
The Buccaneers have been playing with their cards close to the vest on player information for a few weeks now. That is no different with Ryan Jensen.
The loss of Ryan Jensen has been a low point for the Buccaneers over the last few weeks. No team with Super Bowl hopes is ever going to be totally ok after losing an All-Pro talent like Jensen ahead of the regular season.
The Bucs can stem the bleeding by using some of their excellent depth options, but the communication on the Jensen end has been strange.
Why haven’t we received a diagnosis?
The @Buccaneers don't know or the team doesn't want to say?
— David J. Chao - ProFootballDoc (@ProFootballDoc) August 14, 2022
(And they have no obligation to tell us.)
In my two decades as @NFL head team physician, swelling never prevented a diagnosis. Certainly it could affect return timeline but we always knew a range. https://t.co/rU1jW8AhxJ
Bucs fans aren’t alone in wondering about this. Dr. Chao knows his stuff better than most, and anyone that has ever suffered a knee injury on their own can also attest to the fact that the Bucs not knowing the injury is not what has kept us from getting any concrete answers on this matter.
As Dr. Chao said, the team doesn’t have to disclose anything, but how they are handling this is a message in and of itself.
Speaking from unfortunate experience on this topic and with the ability to see other teams rule players out for the season with ACL tears mere hours of the injury occurs, the Bucs not saying anything is actually good news.
If Jensen really did have a season-ending injury, he would’ve gone through surgery by this point. The Bucs waiting and deploying smokescreens shows us that there is actually a chance that Jensen can return at some point during the Super Bowl campaign.
None of this is to say that Jensen is definitely coming back, but the Bucs would’ve known by now and made the necessary moves if they knew for sure that he is out for the season.
If we can rule out a complete ACL tear, the recovery timeline starts to look much more favorable for Tom Brady to get his main protector back before the playoffs begin.
All of this is conjecture for now, but no news is at least some good news for the Bucs right now. Here’s to hoping that Ryan Jensen can get back to 100% quickly.
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