Early in Episode 3 of the Netflix documentary “Receiver,” Justin Jefferson is driving to the Minnesota Vikings’ follow facility. It is a sunny fall morning, not lengthy after he suffered a proper hamstring harm that put him on injured reserve.
In an audio overlay, reporters focus on whether or not Jefferson might milk the harm for leverage in contract negotiations. Absent a brand new deal, the concept went, Jefferson may be clever to take a seat out the group’s remaining 12 video games to eradicate the possibility of additional harm earlier than his large payday.
A severe visage crossed Jefferson’s face, a glower that overcame his usually joyous expression. The message was not delicate.
“Nobody, nobody, nobody on this sport,” he mentioned, repeating for emphasis, “can ever inform me to not play or to tank the season or to do any of that different stuff as a result of I am not that sort of individual. I need to play. I really like the sport of soccer. I need to be the very best. To ensure that that to occur, I’ve obtained to be on the market on that subject. … There isn’t any prolonging the harm, there is not any, ‘Oh he is sitting out due to the contract. It is not any of that. In any respect.”
Quickly, we study medical particulars that weren’t clear to the general public on the time. Jefferson had felt a pop on the time of the harm, and Tyler Williams — the Vikings’ vice chairman of participant well being and efficiency — termed its severity “excessive grade.” That was seemingly a reference to the kind of pressure by which the muscle tears fully. The everyday timetable for restoration in such accidents, Williams advised Netflix, is 8 to 10 weeks.
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That data was the unseen however factual backdrop for an unlucky interval when some followers and media members questioned Jefferson’s dedication to returning as rapidly as potential. The Vikings opened his follow window 31 days after the harm, and he returned to follow on a restricted foundation. With out the total set of details, it was affordable to surprise why he didn’t resume enjoying quickly after. One other 32 days handed earlier than that occurred, and in complete Jefferson’s restoration was a nine-week course of that spanned seven video games and a bye.
In actuality, after all, he was shifting on a regular timetable for the harm he suffered, one designed to permit for optimum therapeutic and minimal likelihood of re-injury.
As soon as he returned, Jefferson made it by 13 performs earlier than taking a direct hit to the again from Las Vegas Raiders security Marcus Epps. Once more, “Receiver” offers essential and beforehand unknown context. Upon returning to the huddle, Jefferson was coughing oddly. He walked to the sideline, kneeled and commenced spitting blood. Alarmed medical employees members requested him if he had maybe bitten his tongue, making a supply of bleeding. He had not.
Required by the NFL to announce the a part of the physique affected of their in-game harm report, the Vikings mentioned Jefferson had a chest harm. As he continued to spit out blood within the blue medical tent, a Vikings physician landed on a extra particular prognosis. Jefferson had suffered a “pulmonary contusion,” in essence a bruised lung.
An examination at a neighborhood hospital revealed Jefferson had not damaged any ribs, nor did he have a extra severe harm corresponding to a collapsed lung. The bruise itself was manageable, Jefferson was advised. He practiced with what he later known as an “inner bruise” and performed all however three of the Vikings’ offensive performs of their subsequent sport, six days later at Cincinnati.
The upshot right here is that Jefferson, who hadn’t missed a sport due to harm since highschool, suffered two severe maladies in 2023, and the small print dominated his flip within the ensemble narrative of “Receiver.” Actually they had been probably the most related and dramatic moments of an in any other case disappointing yr, and in Episode 6, Jefferson lamented that they overshadowed a late-season surge that put him over the 1,000-yard mark in his 10-game season.
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However the emphasis additionally pushed again on any doubts concerning the best way Jefferson dealt with himself, his motivation to play and the function that his contract negotiations — which had been placed on maintain earlier than the season, however culminated this spring with a four-year extension price $140 million — performed in figuring out his return.
A cynic would possibly take into account this all an train in revisionist historical past, however there isn’t a motive to doubt the small print as introduced within the documentary. They comport with contemporaneous indications that the Vikings would seemingly use the entire accessible follow time to ramp him up earlier than the expiration of the window.
The NFL has an extended historical past of offering minimal harm data on gamers due to a need for uniformity of knowledge throughout 32 groups and for different, much less noble causes. Most groups want to not give their opponents data that would assist them plan for an upcoming sport, and in some circumstances, there could be concern of an harm being focused by opponents.
On a relative scale, the Vikings had been clear on Jefferson’s progress. Their follow reviews, which listed his participation as “restricted” till the week he returned, had been a dependable guidepost.
However Jefferson nonetheless heard the general public questioning, and primarily based on the expression on his face in Episode 3, he wasn’t blissful about it. Think about the report amended, as soon as and for all.
