Could Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels’ elbow dislocation have been avoided?
Many say Daniels should and will wear a brace, and that it will prevent a future dislocation. But if it were that simple, why wasn’t Daniels wearing a brace to play after his elbow dislocation in 2025 vs. Seattle?
“I think this was just a freak occurrence again,” Dr. Michael Alaia said. Dr. Alaia was a guest of Grant Paulsen and Danny Rouhier on Grant & Danny, Tuesday on 106.7 The Fan. “You know, it’s hard to put precautions on a professional athlete. They’ve usually got to meet three criteria to return to play...They have to have painless range of motion, there have to be no senses of objective instability. So the athlete has to feel the joint is completely
stable, and they have to have full strength.”
Life is not so simple that everyone’s body, in this case, joints, respond identically to treatments. That said, Dr. Alaia made it clear that orthopedic surgeons are sometimes surprised by what happens to athletes who have completed the prescribed rehabilitation process.
“These are freak occurrences. Honestly, when you talk about a hinge joint like the elbow coming down like that with rotational force, there’s really not much you can do to prevent that from happening. Whether it be bracing or ‘okay, wear this or don’t do this.' I mean, this could have happened to anyone at any time.”
“So, to answer your question, no, I don’t think it was preventable.”
Paulsen, hearing this, responded, asking basically, if a brace is such a silver bullet or magical preventative as many are implying, then why wasn't Daniels wearing a brace Sunday against the Cowboys?
Dr. Alaia didn’t even pause: “Because it’s not. And the brace is not necessary, nor is it indicated a lot of times. When you see people that tear their ACL, sometimes they will come back to sports and wear a brace, whether it be through skiing or your everyday athlete. They could still tear their ACL through the brace. The brace only protects against movement in certain planes.”
Alaia went on to explain how many variables affect how athletes move their joints, making injury prevention much harder than we might think. “When you fall and land on an outstretched hand like Jayden did, there are loads that are being transmitted to that joint with rotation with axial load. You cannot prevent those movements simply by wearing a brace. It is impossible.”
“The brace can help certain side-to-side motions, but when you come down and land like that with torsion load directly onto the extremity, there's nothing that a brace can really do to prevent that.”
More evidence for all of us to realize that, though we learn to comprehend, this life is never so simplistic that we ever comprehend exhaustively.
This article originally appeared on Commanders Wire: Commanders QB Jayden Daniels elbow dislocation was 'freak occurrence'
