Friday, August 14, 2015

Taylor Goes Down

It should come as no surprise to any lifelong Ole Miss fan that one of the Rebels' most valuable up and coming players suffered a shoulder injury from boxing the day after an Ole Miss blogger (me) wrote that he was a key ingredient to winning the SEC West.

That's what happened to sophomore Rod Taylor yesterday, just one day removed from being installed as a 1st team right guard.

My guess is that redshirt freshman Jordan Sims just got a golden opportunity to work his way into Matt Luke's offensive line plans. 

As for Taylor, they say he will be out two or three weeks and then try to play through the injury with surgery to come after the season. 

I've never torn a labrum, but I'm more than a little skeptical that an SEC lineman can take repeated shots from opposing defensive tackles and withstand the pain for very long. I'm also not a doctor, but I'll play one on this blog and say it wouldn't surprise me if we don't hear much out of Taylor this season. I hope I am wrong.

UPDATE: I asked an orthopedic friend of mine if playing an entire season through a torn labrum is possible.

His response: "Probably. Just won't be as good."

Ugh.