JPP Gets Back Surgery. Now What?

The 2nd big injury of the season comes over a month before training camp starts. Jason Pierre-Paul, the Giants best defensive end has had successful surgery on his back today to repair a herniated disc. The doctors say it will take 12 weeks or approximately 3 months to have a full recovery. Now if you do the math, that gets him healthy for the start of the regular season against the Cowboys. Obviously there is plenty of recovery work from now until then so who knows what kind of set backs he may encounter.

It is common knowledge that he had a lingering back issue when he was in college but what has recently been reported is that he was playing with back discomfort all of last season, contributing to the sharp decrease in numbers. Apparently that discomfort had gotten worse within the past few months, the treatment was not helping, so doctors decided that surgery was the best option.

Short term, this means more work for players like “Yosi” or Adrian Tracy, a player that got a few reps during the season last year. Also Adewale Ojomo who had a team high 4 sacks in last years preseason games but saw very little action in the regular season. Rookie 3rd round pick Damontre Moore will also be getting plenty of reps when training camp comes along. Right now however, it is looking like Kiwi and Tuck as the starters.

I have some issues with how the Giants handled the whole situation. They knew of the back injuries in college, did they not know his back was bothering him last year? With his back bothering him for the past couple months, this means they knew of his injury during the draft, why not go defense in the first round? The Giants defense was the 4th worst in the league in giving up pass plays over 20 yards , why not draft a corner? Rhodes and Trufant were both available at 19. A good defensive line makes a secondary much better. You saw the difference in the last two seasons. No pressure on the QB = all day to throw = all day for receivers to get loose. The team knew that JPP was hurt going into the draft and they still draft an offensive tackle/guard/center that was in no way the BPA.

Bottom line, JPP needs to get healthy as soon as possible. He had so much work to do this off-season so he could beat the double teams that had stopped him last year. Without that dominant pass rush, the Giants “secondary” will be abused once again.