Something in Tyler’s Conklin’s left foot popped in the first one-on-one drill of training camp in August. His foot swelled before he could take off his cleats.
“I was like, “Ah, here we go,” Conklin said.
The pop was the fifth metatarsal bone in his left foot breaking. It’s a common sports injury with its own name – a Jones fracture – and often is brought on by pounding and repeated stress. It’s also a feared injury because blood flow in that region of the foot is minimal, making recovery time longer and difficult to predict.
A few days later, doctors spoke out loud the words Conklin already had read on the Internet: Recovery could take six weeks to six months.