Philadelphia Eagles: Looking at obituary from 2019 season

Medical Staff/Trainers

This team has been suspiciously dishonest about the injuries its players have suffered the past two seasons. Nothing quite epitomized this like the curious case of Mack Hollins.

Drafted in 2017, Hollins was placed on Injured Reserve at the beginning of the 2018 season for a groin injury. When asked about Hollins by the press, Pederson would say almost every time he was “week to week.”

Over a year later, entering the 2019 season, coach Pederson was still saying the same thing.

An ex-Eagles linebacker Emmanuel Acho even blasted the Eagles medical staff on Twitter back in 2017.

This came as the Eagles revamped their medical staff after their Super Bowl run from the 2017 season, replacing doctors and trainers who had been with the team for years. Immediately after that, players started getting injured at a higher rate in both the 2018 and 2019 season.

I want to be careful here, because I do not wish to imply there was ever any malpractice on the parts of the Eagles medical staff or organization. I am sure they are doing the best job they can, in the role in which they are employed. I wish to be considerate of the medical staff and the job they do keeping the Eagles on their feet.

But something has to give here. After their shake up in the 2018 offseason, reports emerged last year that the medical staff was once again being shaken up. The Eagles organization claimed they were just replacing interim members of the medical staff and it was no big deal.

Well, the 2019 season happened, and to no one’s surprise, injuries are still plaguing the team. One particular situation stands out from this season involving tight end Ertz.

Originally reported to have sustained cracked ribs during the Week 16 game against the Cowboys, Ertz was seen by medical and returned to the game.

After the game, it was revealed that Ertz had sustained a lacerated kidney on top of the cracked ribs. A source in the Eagles organization reported to the Philadelphia Inquirer, “Ertz returned to the Dallas game after suffering the injury; presumably no one knew of the kidney damage.”

But the story gets worse. After missing the Week 17 regular-season finale against the New York Giants, Ertz was cleared to play in the Wild Card Round against the Seahawks, two weeks after sustaining a lacerated kidney.

Online resource Medicinenet.com says a lacerated kidney has a heal time of about six weeks, although it can be quicker in certain circumstances. Considering Ertz’s comments after the game about playing through injury, the fact he was cleared to play so soon should be viewed as a major concern.

This is just the latest and most obvious situation where something does not seem right with the Eagles medical staff. There were other issues this season too, including the bizarre decision by Jackson not to get surgery on his injury right away.

If Jackson had just gone and had the surgery after Week 2, who knows how well this team could have performed down the stretch.

There is also the case of Kamu Grugier-Hill choosing not to report a concussion, only to tough it out in-game and report it afterwards instead.

Overall, it is impossible to predict sports injuries, especially in football. It is a violent sport in nature and diagnosing injuries when players are apprehensive or unwilling to self-report will always be an issue.

With that being said, no other team this season dealt with injuries the way the Eagles did throughout the 2019 season. And while it is a credit to the players and coaches for dragging this team into the playoffs, injuries will need to be handled much better in 2020 and beyond.

Otherwise, this team may be limping into the finale of the 2020 season looking just as haggard.

The missteps by the medical staff had this season were concerning, especially because there is no way of knowing if the stories that were made public are all there is to it.

The NFL is historically very apprehensive to admit blame when players are injured on their watch. But considering the stories we do know, the medical department of the Eagles may require an independent audit and review in the offseason to determine what, if any, issues are causing this team to have two seasons of above average injury rates.