Jackson has back surgery; Rams nation holds its breath

Guy’s a stud….might be great for my Seahawks if he can’t play us twice next year, but he’s just too awesome a player to dislike. Hopefully he heals as fast as he runs!

I’m prayin’ for you Steve. No man is made of iron. Yet, we’ve worked you to death to win 6 games in three years.

we grabbed 2 tight ends in the draft instead of wasting a pick on a second RB. All you guys who are worried obviously don’t know much about great draft strategy.

We are clearly using the “cross your fingers and pray that you’re only true offensive weapon who is coming off back surgery can take a beating and totally support the rookie QB-lead offense without getting injured because we are totally screwed if he goes down” strategy. I don’t see what could go wrong.

Even if Jackson does have trouble recovering, it is all good because we will get to throw our $50 million QB coming off an injury and who hasn’t played football in a year directly into the line of fire. That’s just valuable on-the-job experience.

…even though I wanted Suh, Sam Bradford was a hell of a consolation prize. But as round after round happened without an RB, I was truly po’d. Unacceptable even if we sign Westbrook, which seems to be at a stand still anyway.

Is not coming. His doctor has recommended that if he wanted to continue to play he should do it on real grass. If he becomes a Ram I would be totally surprised.

A herniated disk will bulge out and rub on the nerve that runs from your spinal cord to your ankle. Damage that nerve and you could have anything from an ache in your gluteus (that’s your buttcheek) to muscle spasms and charlie horse type cramps in your hamstring that will literally put you on the ground. I almost crashed my car the first time it happened to me. It’s possible he had some problems with his leg that caused his play to drop off a bit.

A cortisone injection to the spine is very common first treatment for his problem. It doesn’t do anything but reduces swelling, which can take the pressure off the nerve, but in most cases it’s a temporary fix. Sometimes lasts months, sometimes weeks, sometimes the nerve is too fried for it to matter.

Rest, strengthening the abdominal muscles and learning how to work your back, an operators manual so to speak, is usually the first step even before the injection. For a couple of years I would take 2 or 3 weeks off work just to lay flat and take pressure of the disk, and that would fix me up for about 6-9 months before I would break down again. But one time it just never did get better, and I finally had to submit to surgery. I couldn’t walk at all by that time so there was no avoiding it. Looking back on it, waiting was a big mistake because my nerve was getting permanently damaged and I didn’t know it.

An outpatient Microdisectomy is what I had, and from the sound if it he did too. They take out some bone and some disk, but they do leave some disk there. (more here)

It’s the most commonly performed fix and they send you home the same day…hence the “minor” tag. There is absolutely nothing minor about neurosurgery, I don’t care what anyone says. In my case, they had to burn off scar tissue that had built up around and was strangling the nerve. Since the surgery does nothing at all to repair any nerve damage, only allevaite the pressure on it, in the worst case you can have problems for life.

Sounds like he got in pretty early, so I bet he turns out better than I did.