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Speaker 4: Hey, everyone. Jeff Rosen here with your daily DLP. We're gonna get right into it. You can see that I have a guest here. We're not gonna waste his precious time. Doctor Jimmy Liao has joined us. Detroit morning rounds. You you know you you guys know him. If you've watched the DLP at all, you know we love doctor Liao. And, Jimmy, I'm a call I'm just gonna call you Jimmy because Yes. You're my friend. It's easier that way. But Doc Works as well for anybody walking. Welcome to the Daily Mail.

Speaker 5: Call you Jeff. Are you Jeff? Are you the Riz? What what do I call you?

Speaker 4: Whatever you need to. Jeff works. The Riz is what my daughter and her friends call me, which is Okay. A little strange. But

Speaker 5: Well, my kids have come up with a nickname for themselves that you might wanna consider Scabitti Rizzler sixty seven. Now being over the age of 15, I have no idea what any of that means, so I apologize if I offended anybody. But feel free to take that if you want, Jeff.

Speaker 4: I I don't know what that means.

Speaker 5: If you wanna hit that 12 and under age demographic and you're missing that part in your podcast, you might wanna choose that.

Speaker 4: I tend to skew older when I use big words, but, you know, we're we're gonna have some fun with this. Let's I mean, we have a draft class to break down, and you are the proper person to do it. And I think just overall to get into it, they didn't take anybody who's chronically injured this year. What the hell?

Speaker 5: Yeah. I know. What's going on with that? I guess the past two years, Brad Holmes had beaten into him that, you know, maybe we should take some lower risk guys. Maybe if you start off with healthier, younger people, maybe they'll stay younger and healthier. Again, no guarantee. But playing the odds in your favor, it might be a smart thing to do.

Speaker 4: Yeah. And, you know, just starting with the top, Blake Miller. Legendary durability at Clemson. Like, you can't ask for a more, trend breaking pick for the lions and their propensity for taking guys with injuries than you can with Blake Miller. You gave him a score. So you you scaled on a scale of one to 10 the relative injury risk, which I think is great. You gave Blake Miller a one. And I'm just gonna wonder, why didn't he get a zero?

Speaker 5: He had a wrist surgery in the spring of two thousand twenty four. So that was really the only knock on him. That wrist surgery did not stop him from starting 54 games straight, Did not stop him from having 3,778 snaps, which was a Clemson record. But a wrist surgery, you do worry about potentially arthritic issues down the road. But clearly, he had two years of proof of recovery afterwards. He's a total Ironman, so kept his medical concern level pretty low at one. Also, his age of 22, any guys who are 22 and younger, I don't knock them for age. 23 and over, I will start bumping up their concern level just a little bit.

Speaker 4: And the lions did a pretty good job of drafting younger in general this year, didn't they?

Speaker 5: Absolutely. Yeah. I put out an article just earlier today on my substack where everybody that they drafted was 23 and under. A lot of older prospects in this draft, Eric DeCosta, the Ravens GM, had quoted a percentage of 18% of guys in this draft were 24 and over. The Lions did not draft any of those guys. So there might have been a clear directive given by Brad Holmes. We want younger guys. 23 might be our limit.

Speaker 4: It's crazy to me when you think about how young Blake Miller is and all those starts that he got. That's, that those two hands don't normally go together.

Speaker 5: Yeah. You gotta love that. I mean, he's not as young as Pune Sewell was when he came out, but 22 is still pretty good. The only two guys that were younger than him that were on my list that I was on my wish list were Spencer Fano and Caleb Lohman. Both of those guys are 21 and with totally clean medical history. So those guys were zero out of 10 medical concern level. But Blake Miller was in that top three wish list for me for the OTs.

Speaker 4: Love it. Love it. Let's get into Derek Moore, people that many fans know from his Michigan days. You obviously know him from Michigan days. He got a I believe you gave him a two out of 10. Any what what's the primary concern, if any, with Derek Moore?

Speaker 5: Before the pre draft process, he was at a one out of 10. So really very, very clean. He had missed one game in 2024 with an unspecified injury. The only thing with with him was his age, 23, so I bumped him up to one out of 10. However, pre Combine, there was a hamstring issue. A strained hamstring prior to the Combine. That always perks my ears up. Hamstrings, as we know with Alex Anzalone last, early last season during the training camp, hamstrings can be used as a cover for other things. For Alex Anzalone, trying to get a new deal, get some more money out of that. With Derek Moore and any of these pre draft guys, when the hamstring prevents them from working out at the combine, you just never know if there's something else that might be going on. However, since lines took him in the second round, suggests that the hamstring was probably just that, a minor hamstring, which would be no issue. But that's why I bumped up his post combine score to a two out of 10. But since the Lions drafted him in the second round, he's probably back down to a one out of 10 concern.

Speaker 4: That's good. So hamstrings are a rough issue. We had DJ Reed last year. We've had Ennis Raichstra for two years with it. Actually, four if you go back into his Missouri days. You're not concerned at all with that more is gonna be something chronic like that?

Speaker 5: There is a recurrence rate for hamstrings, but hamstrings are so common. You can't really knock players with them. Any fast twitch guy almost certainly is gonna have some kind of hamstring issue at some point in his career. So that's just a minimal issue going forward.

Speaker 4: Good. That's reassuring. I like that. Stick with the Michigan Wolverines as the Lions did. Linebacker Jimmy Rolder. You gave him, I believe you gave him a three out of 10. And this is a guy who didn't play a ton in college. So talk to me about Roeder and his, injury background.

Speaker 5: Yeah. I watch all the Michigan games as a Michigan fan. Roeder did jump off the screen for me in his final season. I was like, who is this guy?

Speaker 4: Agreed. I've

Speaker 5: seen him before, and it's like, this guy's making plays. Similar to what I thought about Jaishang Barham, who was the other guy who really just jumped off the screen for me. He was sort of on my wish list too. But Jimmy Roeder really impressed me in his final season. He had a bunch of minor issues throughout his whole college career. None of it was specific, though. He had a unspecified injury during his final year, Missed a game for that. Multiple minor injuries for what he quoted as saying little stuff the year before. And then a whole bunch of unspecified injuries in 2023 limited him to just six games. Wearing a right elbow brace during his final season, so nothing specific with him, which makes it hard to really gauge his medical concern level. That means it could be anywhere from two out of 10 to eight out of 10. But with all the many issues going on, I had him at a three out of 10 medical concern level. His age is still very good, though, at just 22.

Speaker 4: He plays the game where he is go he he's a violent player. How much concern does that give you for a guy whose style is like, I'm going to go all out on every snap, and I'm going to try to steal the soul of the guy that I'm tackling? Because that that doesn't necessarily pour Ted Ted in great durability.

Speaker 5: Yeah. It's a double edged sword. You want guys who are physically aggressive and hit hard, like a Brian Branch, but then those guys are potentially more prone to injuries. So Yeah. You just have to take

Speaker 3: the good with the bad there.

Speaker 4: Yeah. And you don't really wanna ask him to not be that guy either.

Speaker 5: Yeah. You don't wanna change who he is. Lions want these tough, aggressive guys with grit. Sometimes that comes with injuries, and maybe that's part of why we've had so many injuries over the past couple years. These guys were telling him to be tough, be aggressive. We're telling our cornerbacks to be tough and aggressive. And now we had two cornerbacks last year with shoulder surgeries. So they potentially can be conned with this gritty, tough attitude, and there's consideration to change that philosophy and dial back just just a tiny bit, especially like with these cornerbacks who their main job is to cover, defend passes. Yes. It'd be great if you guys are coming up and stuff in the wrong and being aggressive there as well, but maybe you need a

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Speaker 5: I'll add back just a little bit with certain positions.

Speaker 4: The audience applauds that. That's that's something that has been as you know, from being in our Patreon Slack and everything like that, that's a big topic of conversation is, you know, maybe throttling it back just a little bit, to get 15 games on a DJ Reed instead of eight. You know, that that sort of thing. That's that's what I meant. That'd be

Speaker 5: so that'd be so nice if we had a healthy team going to the final games of the season and into the playoffs. Well, that that'd be a great feeling. Of course, you gotta balance that with you gotta get into the playoffs, which we didn't do last year.

Speaker 3: Feel pretty good we're gonna get back there.

Speaker 4: I've got it. So the next player, he has a zero. Is it is it allowed for the lions to draft a player with zero injury concerns like Keith Abney?

Speaker 5: Yeah. It better be allowed. They need to start hitting these zeros. Keith Abney, super young, 21 years old, very clean, only three years of college, possible hand injury 2025, but it was very loose report of that. I did look into that game footage and found that maybe he had a little bit of extra padding on that left hand. It wasn't a club situation like Amreek Robertson, so nothing more serious like that, but maybe he got it dinged up. But regardless, he played through it and played all his games in 2025 and 2024, just opted out of the bowl in 2025. So perfect reliability over two years. So very, very low concern with him.

Speaker 4: Not a, if he Malifon was situation where he missed six weeks with a finger that wasn't broken.

Speaker 5: Right. Yeah. Abney played through this. So, yeah, we don't need any more of these iffy situations.

Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Move on. Kendrick Law, I just watched him. He is another player who delivers violence when he plays, and I wonder if that you gave him a one, but I wonder if his playing style will wind up making that look a little bit low in in time. But, talk to me about the Kentucky wide receiver return man blocking wide receiver.

Speaker 5: Again, a good age with him, with Kendrick Law, 22 years old. Just minor stuff in his career. Some unspecified minor injury in camp of 2025, but played in every single game. 2024, missed two games with a lower body injury. Before that, 13 out of 14 games in 2023, 11 games in 2022, a remote ankle injury in high school. So nothing really overall seems very concerning for him at all. So a very low medical concern for him at a one out of 10 for me.

Speaker 4: Yeah. And he's coming in. He didn't play a whole lot until his final season at Kentucky. You know, being at Alabama for a couple of years where he was chained. I won't say chained to the bench, but he didn't play a lot. I think he had, I think, 500 total snaps there, in, what was it, three years? So low volume, low low low low a lot of tread on the tires. Yeah. Low mileage. Thank you.

Speaker 5: Mileage absolutely is a factor. Absolutely. And that's a good point to bring up. So what'd you think about him the lines trading up to get this guy? I mean, what's your thought about that?

Speaker 4: So, I'm glad you asked that. So this is this year's Giovanni Manu, Isaac Tyslop, Roderick Martin, where they trade for a guy who probably wasn't going to be taken by anybody else in that range. I I shouldn't say that about this slot because I know that there were that the Bills and the 40 niners were both hot on his heels. But the fact that they did it two rounds later and they gave away picks that they weren't gonna use anyways, I'm fine with it. I I watched this Kentucky tape. I watched quite a few games. I don't really see how he fits as an offensive player in the NFL, but some of that is Kentucky's scheme. They used him. Their offense was just not fun to watch. And and nothing from it really translates to the NFL other than he can catch a swing pass and make the first guy miss. And that's but return ability, blocking special teams, special teams especially is where I think he's gonna last. And, like, I'm good with that. You know, if if you wanna take a guy in the the fifth round who's gonna be on your special teams for his entire rookie contract and be good at it, I'm alright with that. In in this draft, yeah. That's had had it happened in the third round and it had happened in prior drafts where it was a lot deeper of a player pool, probably wouldn't like it so much. But this year, I'm good. I would've I would've been fine if he'd done at that pick, like, if he was their last pick because, you know, that's they didn't they didn't really need anything else, but they did draft Skyler Gil Howard, who had your highest injury risk of any Lions draft pick. The, Texas Tech, defensive lineman who we're still trying to figure out, is he an end? Is he an edge? Is he a tackle? Is he Josh Pascal two point o? What's going on with Skyler Gil Howard and his four score?

Speaker 5: Skyler Gil Howard, 23 years old, so just a slight bump up because of his age. The main thing with him is a left ankle surgery in October 2025, which ended his season. Anytime a guy has no proof of live game recovery afterwards, you always have some concern there. The mechanism of injury was described as a leg quip mechanism. There were reports that he had a chance to return late in the season, which is reassuring, which suggests the injury wasn't too major. A leg whip, like we saw multiple times over the past couple years, last year with Christian Mahogany had a leg whip causing a fibula fracture. So that's something that could be going on with Skyler Gil Howard. More severe level, Adam Hutchinson leg whip, Khalil Dorsey leg whip, tib fib fracture. So I don't think anywhere near that range because he is available to play now. So, otherwise, that would have been a nine month issue. So the fact that he had the chance to return late in the season, reassuring. The other possibilities were a high ankle sprain, which can cause a tightrope surgery issue. So none of those issues, if it's a high ankle sprain, tightrope, or a fibula fracture are really significant long range concerns. But since we don't know what's going on exactly and there's no proof of recovery, I had them at a four out of 10 medical concern.

Speaker 4: I'm with you on that. I'd like to see that that they could come back and, like, actually play. It's just reassuring that way. You're always gonna have some trepidation if if you haven't seen it happen. I think that's one of the things, to to scale back a few, spots. Jordan Tyson, the wide receiver from Arizona State, incredibly talented guy, but we haven't seen him get back yet. And that was scary to me because it felt like he could have come back. And, I don't know how you I don't know if you if you evaluated him at all, but he was a guy that scared the hell out of me, honestly. And I I didn't think that the Lions had much interest in taking a wide receiver that early. But his medical profile was very to me, and I'm glad that that we avoided that one.

Speaker 5: Yeah. I did profile Jordan Tyson. I had him at a six out of 10 medical concern because like you mentioned, a lingering hamstring all of 2025 and the hamstring preventing combine and pro day workouts, yeah, this is a NS rake straw flashback situation here and not really very uncomfortable situation. You did have a private pro day, but still missing combine in your pro day school workouts with a hamstring that's been long for three months, four months, five months, who knows, absolutely a major concern there. So you're right on with that.

Speaker 4: We'll wrap up the Lions draft class with Tyre West, the guy who I still haven't watched enough to have a great opinion upon. But, Tyre West got a two. What's going on with him?

Speaker 5: 23 years old, so just slightly older. Not a big deal yet, especially for a seventh round pick. But he had a possible concussion in 2025, missed another game for unknown reason. 2024 missed a game with unknown reason. But overall, very reliable. Played 12 games, 12 games, 13 games, 11 games throughout his college career. So really pretty low concern based on that very good reliability. Isolated concussion isn't a major concern because he does have a recurrent history. So with all that put together, just a two out of 10 medical concern with him.

Speaker 4: It's crazy to me that we're talking about a guy with a four as the biggest concern. I'd I'd again, we started with that, but I wanna I wanna sort like, did did Brad learn, or did is it just, like, a fluke of nature that that they wound up being guys that are durable?

Speaker 3: I don't know, but I'll take

Speaker 5: it. Yeah. He's there's I don't think any question that this offseason, he's changing his philosophy. When you look at the free agent class that's coming in compared to the people who are departing, the additions are significantly younger. I tracked it and charted it in it, and they're two and a half

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Speaker 5: Here is younger, the additions versus the subtractions. It's a major major age difference there, and the concern level was also lower. He has jettisoned a lot of these higher concern players. He had, talked about DJ Reader, I think, on your podcast a couple days ago.

Speaker 3: Mhmm.

Speaker 5: These guys are leaving. Davenport's leaving. Zach Cunningham's leaving. Taylor Decker, they wanna hit him take a contract adjustment because his risk was so high. So they almost pushed him out the door there. So they dramatically decreased the age and concern level going forward into this season.

Speaker 4: I love it. Can I ask you about Jermoud McCoy who fell? Yeah. We he was certainly should have been in consideration at 17 if he were healthy. He wound up being the first pick of the fourth round. He fell all that way. Every NFL team passed on him at least twice. What's the outlook for him for because to to to go over the the the background on it. He tore his ACL. He needed surgery. This was at the end of the 2024 season. He was not cleared to play and or even work out until after the combine, and even then, he only ran in a straight line. He did no agility drills, no coverage drills, or anything like that. Like, I hate it for the dude, but is that is that, like, a nine out of ten, ten out of 10 type of risk with him?

Speaker 5: 10 out of 10 with Jermab McCoy. His concern level just kept rising, like, Dan Campbell meme. And, unfortunately, it just kept rising through the whole pre draft process. Normally, with an ACL, not that major of a concern as long as there's no cartilage damage. We saw that with Jameson Williams who's been fantastic since his ACL. However, with a delayed recovery, you start worrying about a cartilage concern. That was my concern early in the pre dry process. Then he skipped the combine workouts. He did do his pro day, but he looked a little stiff with some of those agility drills. Then really the big concern jump was when there were reports coming out with a degenerative knee and then a specific report by Tom Pellicero of bone plugs to repair cartilage in the knee. That is major. That's an end stage issue where that cartilage has been completely worn out to the point that you're trying to replace it with other cartilage from other areas of your knee. That's really a end stage degenerative knee issue that you're just hoping these pulling plugs will work to help out. So major, major cartilage issues with him.

Speaker 4: That's awful. That's so my understanding and and I learned this actually in in doing some research on it. They don't do microfracture surgery anymore, but that's sort of what this that procedure has replaced. Am I correct on that?

Speaker 5: Absolutely. Yeah. Microfracture, we saw that with Jadeveon Clowney fifteen years or so ago. That used to be the go to. Microfracture is when you're just poking a bunch of holes in that exposed bone, praying that the scar tissue sorta acts like cartilage. Now they're trying this thing called, like, OATS procedure. It stands for osteochondral autograft transfer system, where you're taking cartilage from other areas of the knee that aren't weight bearing and moving it to that weight bearing portion of the knee that's causing symptoms. You're using your own cartilage, so the hope is that the body is happy with it and likes it, doesn't reject it, and that cartilage can live there for as long as possible. Unfortunately, sometimes there's there is a long term still risk with that. It doesn't last forever. And the issues that cause the cartilage damage in the first place are often permanent and not correctable. So you're still continuing to do damage to that area of the cartilage.

Speaker 4: So that brings up the obvious question with Kirby Joseph. Is he we don't know ex the exact nature of his injury other than that has been described as a potentially degenerative knee condition. Is this something that could be an end thing for him as well, or do you think he's more progressed than that?

Speaker 5: That is the concern with Kirby Joseph. The words out of his mouth was unfixable. The words out of Dan Campbell's mouth, wear and tear, something we just need to manage. So it's not something that's peeling up. It's not something that's fixable, which is highly concerning. For example, with talk about Jermaine McCoy, they could attempt a fix with his articular cartilage damage. With Kirby Joseph, assuming that's what's going on, apparently, there's not even an attempt to be able to fix it. So what is going on here? Is this such diffuse cartilage damage that you can't even try to fix it? Is there so much damage that it's just a fix is just not even gonna work, so it's not even worth trying? These are all very concerning things going on with Kirby Joseph.

Speaker 4: So pain management is probably the the biggest thing for him, or or is it is it going to be, like, if he plays, his his poor his athletic performance will be hindered and or impacted by the the degenerative condition in his knee? I can't I can't talk for this minute. I'll turn it to you.

Speaker 5: Absolutely. It comes down to pain and discomfort, but the issue with that is all it takes is a tiny bit of discomfort to dramatically affect your athletic ability. It's easy to sit here and say, oh, just play through the pain. It doesn't work that way. Otherwise, guys will be playing to their forties. It doesn't work that way. The knee still has to be fluid. It has to be able to move smoothly. It It has to be able to move without discomfort for you to do the cuts, do the jumping, do all that. And if there's discomfort and if there's subsequent increased pain and swelling, then those potentially can be career altering things. You look at what happened with Kirby Joseph last year. This issue started in training camp in July. And by week two of the regular season, he was already on the injury report with a knee. And then by week six, his season was over. He tried to come back later, but he couldn't make it through more than one practice in a row without having to be shut down for the rest of the week. So what's going on with him is he's trying to play through it, but that knee is not responding well. Something's going on, inflammation, pain, swelling that's flaring up after he tries to play through it that's not letting him continue?

Speaker 4: That's not encouraging, unfortunately, but that's that's the reality of where we're at. Let's talk about his running mate, Brian Branch. Achilles, normal prognosis time is to get back on the field. Should have him back. I I think you've guesstimated, and I've I've guesstimated as well, sometime between Halloween and Thanksgiving, around that range. But is it realistic to expect him to be back at being Brian Branch again right away?

Speaker 5: I agree with you about that estimate. I think midseason around their range of right on. Coming back right away at a high level, it's possible. Let's look at guys who may have been able to do that in recent years. Our number three overall pick, Jeff Acuda. I know he didn't pan out as a prospect. He tore his Achilles in week one of the season. He was back for the start of the next season. And to me, he looked more athletic than he did prior to the Achilles in their first game. It was sort of incredible. It's like, what the heck? This is unbelievable. It's like the best Achilles recovery I've ever seen. He's out of the way.

Speaker 4: Help him play better, but he was more athletic.

Speaker 5: Yeah. He he looked great. So those first few games, the first half of the season, he looked great. But then the second half of the season, I I don't know what was going on. Probably not an injury issue, but his performance tealed off. And but he's still in the league right now. You look at a couple other guys who have had a really good Achilles recoveries. One of them went in the first round of the February. You know what I'm talking about?

Speaker 4: Achilles. Nope. I'm off on that one.

Speaker 5: Jadarian Price out of Notre Dame running back.

Speaker 4: That's right.

Speaker 5: First round pick. He had an Achilles rupture, but then two excellent college years after that, so good that he became a first round pick. So that's highly encouraging for Brian Branch. Another guy, JK Dobbins, another running back, 2023 Achilles, has looked great since his return from his Achilles. So there are a lot of very optimistic cases recently that give us cautious optimism for Brian Branch. There is a chance that he could look pretty good in 2026. It shouldn't be expected, but I think there's a chance he's looking pretty good in 2026 with a increased chance of looking good in 2027 as well.

Speaker 4: I'll take that. That's that sounds good to me. And he's playing for a new contract this year, so I'm sure there's incentive for him to get back as fast as he can and and try to to show what he can do to to get his to get his money because that's that's what it's all about.

Speaker 5: You're right. With this being a contract here, it wouldn't surprise me if he tries to be there to be ready for the start of the season because it it would be significantly impactful to his contract negotiations if he showed that I can put in a full season after my Achilles. That would be pretty incredible.

Speaker 4: So that would be, what, eight month nine months after the injury? Nine to nine to ten months. Right? He did it in the was it the first week in December, or was it the last week in November?

Speaker 5: December 4 was his Achilles' rupture. So yeah. So to

Speaker 4: week one, that's ten months. Nine well, nine full months.

Speaker 5: About about nine months. Yeah. So it would be slightly early, but wouldn't surprise me if he's trying to hit that target.

Speaker 4: Yeah. Now my understanding is that they have accelerated the the the rehab process so much. There used to always be the concern, and I see this with middle aged guys, my of my generation, where we're playing pickup basketball and we tear our right Achilles. And then two years later, we're back on the court feeling good, and then the left one pops. There's that seems to have the the rehab process and and, you know, regeneration type things, it seems to have get progressed quite a bit. So that's not as big of a risk anymore, is it?

Speaker 5: They do have different procedures now they're doing for the Achilles repair. So, potentially, that helps give it increased strength. So it's possible that they could come back just slightly earlier, but I think it's still we're talking about a ten, eleven month recovery.

Speaker 4: Alright. Good. Enithraig Straw. Give me any hope at all that he can play, please. Even if you have to sugarcoat it.

Speaker 5: No. I I do have cautious optimism with him. I give him a six out of 10 medical concern. I know you're higher than that, which is Yes. Totally legitimate and understandable. But his injuries, they are healable, ACL, core muscle, a lot of guys come back from core muscle totally fine. Hamstrings, a lot of guys have hamstrings, and they're bad for a while, but then they can be fine. Hamstrings can heal up. They do have recurrence, but they can heal up. He's got a shoulder. That is a concern. It potentially could be a recurrent issue, and he's gotta impact that shoulder whenever he makes tackles. So that is a concern. But these issues are healable, so that's the hope that he's just been unlucky over the past few years, and now he's just gonna be lucky from this point on.

Speaker 4: God. That would be nice. Any other returning lions that have any concern level that that should alarm any any of the viewers and fans here?

Speaker 5: Let me take a look at my returning player rankings. The biggest ones for me were Kirby Joseph and Taylor Decker. Taylor Decker is gone at this point. Now one guy that is a higher concern that I think people are, mentioning is Thomas Harper. Safety. He has Kind of important since

Speaker 4: he's the third safety.

Speaker 5: He yeah. He he might be the first safety, before you know it. He has concerns because he had two concussions toward the end of last year, sorta in very close proximity. The the second concussion knocked him out for the season, when you have that many concussions stacking up, each concussion starts, meaning you have a longer return to play timeline. So if he has a concussion early on this season, he could be out for weeks. That's a major reliability concern, especially with branch out for the early part of the season. And Kirby Joseph, we don't know what's going on with him either. So with Thomas Harper is our third cornerback, praying that he doesn't get a concussion, that's a major concern. When you look at how he got his concussions, they're both the same way. He lowered his head and got kneed into the side of the head. So he might need to completely revamp his tackling technique to avoid a future concussion.

Speaker 4: I think I'm okay with him trying to not tackle with his head down. That's that's not that's not what you're taught to do anyways. Like, maybe there's a reason why.

Speaker 5: Yeah. I mean, guys are taught to go low, though, to take try to take out guys. And when a guy is far away from you, you might need to dive to take out his legs to get him down. So easier said than done to not tackle well. Sometimes you have to tackle well in order to make the tackle at all.

Speaker 4: Yeah. I do wanna bring up one last guy, Levi Anserique. Missed last season, not for the spinal fusion surgery, but for a knee. What's it's a one year deal. His contract told. In fact, he's still on the deal that he was last year because he was inactive for the entire season, on the non football injury list. When is enough enough, honestly? And I I say that, like, I I want I want it to work because he busted his ass so hard to get back unprecedented from spinal fusion surgery. But

Speaker 3: there's only so much the body can take, I would think.

Speaker 5: You're right. Incredible recovery from that spinal fusion, l five s one spinal fusion in 2022. So incredible recovery from that. Now, not only that, which is a chronic issue that potentially could flare up at any point. Now we're dealing with the ACL, as you mentioned. This ACL is really curious because he had that ACL repair surgery about a month or two after he signed his one year free agent deal with Alliance, which included a significant amount of guaranteed money. So Alliance are certainly not expecting anything like this to happen at all. So Correct. There is a lot of mystery involved with that ACL. Based on what Dan Campbell said, this ACL actually started in the prior season, which suspects that it was a partial ACL that was bothering him during that 2024 season that maybe got aggravated, maybe got worse, or maybe just the evaluation change and the plan changed. And then he decided to get a full ACL reconstruction during that 2025 off season. So sort of a curious, mysterious situation there. Based on all that, I had suspected the lines were gonna move on from him because somehow curious that whole situation was. But slightly surprising to me is that they're keeping him to see how it goes. But it wouldn't surprise me if during this off season, he doesn't even make it to camp when the Lions decide to move on with healthier players.

Speaker 4: Appreciate that. That's, again, you can't help but remember this. Like, Chris and I in on several occasions, we're like, he's never playing again. We wrote him off. He proved us wrong. I would love for him to do that again, but it's it's getting to be time. That that they drafted his replacements potentially anyways. So,

Speaker 5: you know Yeah. Young Turtle helped him with replacements.

Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 4: Absolutely. That again, the overarching theme, they got younger and they got healthier, both in this draft and in free agency process. As a medical professional, you have to be happy about that.

Speaker 5: Absolutely. Age is a major, major factor in health. So I want a younger, healthier team that helps decrease injury risk. It helps increase the healing rate, less mileage, less wear and tear. You just never know when you're gonna leave your prom and fall off the cliff athletically with that wear and tear mileage issue. Saw that with Kirby Joseph who's only 25. So you just never know when it might happen. Yeah. That's

Speaker 4: all I got for today. Tell people where they can find your work because you have done a fantastic job in documenting all these things throughout your process. So, point people to where they can find your your stuff.

Speaker 5: Yep. On the Internet, jimmy liao m d dot com. Last name is l I a o, also on x@jimmyliaomd.

Speaker 4: Yep. Got the, substack working, which is, like, so informative. I'm there often. And you have a fantastic logo there, by the way. People will wanna go there just to check that out because it's pretty darn sweet.

Speaker 5: I appreciate it.

Speaker 4: We're gonna call that a daily. Thanks to doctor Liao for joining us today. We'll be back. We do this every day. It's the DLP daily. Jeff Rizzo signing out. Be good to one another, everybody.