Sometimes, all it takes is four words.
In the case of New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel, who met with the media on Friday, those words were “we’ll get them back.”
Vrabel was referring to a pair
of Patriots starters currently on injured reserve, left tackle Will Campbell and defensive lineman Milton Williams. The former suffered a reported MCL sprain in Week 12 against the Cincinnati Bengals, with the latter hurting his ankle the previous game against the New York Jets.
Both Campbell and Williams were sent to IR shortly after their injuries, ruling them out for at least four games and creating speculation about their ability to return further down the line. According to their coach, however, their outlook is quite optimistic.
“We have a plan for each guy,” he said. “I appreciate them being good with the plan that we have, talking about being in the meetings, then getting out of meetings early, going to rehab so that there’s some timing and we’re not overloading the training room. And then usually a week before they can start practicing, we’ll get them into meetings full-time, kind of go from there and see. And whether that’s at three weeks or that’s at five or six weeks, it’s all different, but that’s kind of how we plan it out with players that are on injured reserve.”
Williams will be the first of the two eligible to come back from IR. If cleared, he could make his return to practice leading up to the Patriots’ Week 17 game against the New York Jets.
Campbell can come off injured reserve as soon as the following week leading up to the regular season finale versus the Miami Dolphins. Like his teammate, he will have 21 days to return to the active roster once back at practice or else will stay on IRR for the remainder of the season.
