Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback Joe Haden suffered a fractured fibula during the team’s Sunday road win over the Indianapolis Colts and since the game ended the amount of time he’s speculated to miss has slowly shortened.
According to a Sunday evening report by Pro Football Talk, Haden is now expected to miss just three weeks after suffering a slight fracture in his leg. The upper fibula fracture that Haden suffered also isn’t expected to require surgery.
“We’re going back and going straight from the airport to the doctor to see what’s up,” Haden said after Sunday’s game against the Colts.
Assuming the latest reports that Haden will only miss roughly three weeks of action are correct, there will be no need for the Steelers to place him on their Reserve/Injured list as such a move would require him to be sidelined 8 weeks until he would be eligible to return. In short, if the Steelers don’t place Haden on their Reserve/Injured list by Tuesday, that’s great news when it comes to his prognosis.
Now, the Steelers have already started the practice clock on rookie cornerback Cameron Sutton and with the Steelers playing again Thursday night, I will be surprised if he’s activated to the 53-man roster next week and especially if Haden isn’t placed on the teams Reserve/Injured list.
Sutton’s 21-day practice clock runs out on the 20th of November so the Steelers have a week from Tuesday to get him back on their 53-man roster. If they don’t need Sutton against the Titans, they should hold off activating him another week.
Now, do keep in mind that Steelers safety Mike Mitchell suffered an ankle injury during Sunday’s game against the Colts and that might ultimately prevent him from playing against the Tennessee Titans Thursday night. If the Steelers want to promote safety Jordan Dangerfield from their practice squad for that game, they would obviously need to waive a player to make room for him.
Earlier this season, the Steelers had to play a game without safety J.J. Wilcox. With that said, all their cornerbacks were healthy at that time. Keep that in mind as the Steelers might decide to only go with three healthy safeties against the Titans.
In summation, at least it doesn’t sound like Haden will be out for more than a month. Can he make it back in time for the Steelers home game against the New England Patriots? That would be ideal and we’ll now have to wait and see if that ultimately happens.
