Michael Thomas out for the season after ankle surgery complications

The New Orleans Saints may have delivered a minor upset on Sunday in a 36-27 win over the defending Super Bowl champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but the news in Louisiana has not been good ever since. One day after receiving the news that starting quarterback Jameis Winston would be out for the year with a torn anterior cruciate ligament, the Saints got more bad news as their star wide receiver, Michael Thomas is out for the year after complications with off-season ankle surgery according to Kevin Patra of nfl.com.

Thomas, who was selected to the Pro Bowl three straight years from 2017 to 2019,  has not yet played for the Saints in 2021. The fact that Thomas waited until July 23 to have his offseason ankle surgery, created tension between him and the Saints organization at the time.

Thomas initially suffered the ankle injury during the 2020 NFL regular season. He was placed on the injury reserve, and returned to the Saints’ lineup for the playoffs. According to Zac Al-Khateeb of the Sporting News, the Saints wanted Thomas to have his surgery in January. Thomas wanted a second opinion, and waited until the summer before getting the surgery done.

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The delay ultimately made Thomas unavailable for the start of the 2021 NFL season. Now that does not mean Thomas would not have had complications from surgery or be guaranteed to be ready for the start of the season if he had the procedure done in January. What it does mean is that if there were complications, Thomas would have had enough time to recover, and be expected to be on the field at some point for the Saints in 2021. That will no longer be the case, and as a result, the Saints offense will suffer.

The bottom line is that when healthy, Thomas is one of the best receivers in the game. He has the record for most catches by a player in one season (149 in 2019), and led the NFL in receiving yards in 2019 as well with 1725.

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