Shawn Andrews chemical imbalance thread

[Diomedes]

I could care less about how much money Jeff Lurie is paying him.

What pisses me off most is as old as dirt:  the guy was a stud, a bona fide best in league guard, a monster, a player who actually made me happy.....and he shat the bed, proved himself to be quacked out and soft, and proved me a sucker for hoping and believing that maybe the Eagles had a bad motherfarger for a change

[PhillyPhreak54]

What cracks me up is how personal people make it. Some of the comments posted on his YouTube page are ridiculous. Some internet tough guy posted his on the EMB and was flamed. He took exception from others ripping him for ripping Andrews and then it offered to meet a few posters to show him how tough he is.

I don't get the anger towards Andrews. Back injuries are no joke. The rush to judgment about his will to play the game despite him saying otherwise is wrong.

[Eaglez]

What cracks me up is how personal people make it. Some of the comments posted on his YouTube page are ridiculous. Some internet tough guy posted his on the EMB and was flamed. He took exception from others ripping him for ripping Andrews and then it offered to meet a few posters to show him how tough he is.

I don't get the anger towards Andrews. Back injuries are no joke. The rush to judgment about his will to play the game despite him saying otherwise is wrong.

Yeah I don't condone people personally getting upset at Andrews, but if he ever wants to get a large payday in the NFL ever again he needs to do some reputation control to demonstrate that he is working towards shaking his depression (which I imagine he is still struggling with) and documenting his rehab to show he is committed to playing every week at the highest level.  He may be doing it -- but he needs to get a publicist that is able to convey that.

All I hear about Andrews is that "I feel great," the doctors ostensibly think that there is nothing systemically wrong with his back, he conveyed the notion that he was excited to play along side his brother, and yet he's put on the shelf for the rest of the year.  It just seems like a strange sequence of events. 

At this point I'm sure the Eagles are trying to find a way to take the smallest cap hit possible, cut ties, and maybe give him a shot to get his life and health together unless he demonstrates some remarkable change that is worth keeping him around for the 2010-11 season. 

[methdeez]

When he is on IR, insurance also pays for his salary, not the team.

[NC_Eagle]

I blew out a disc in my back a few years ago, I know back injuries are no picnic.  It's just that he hasn't presented an image that makes us think he's been putting 100% into his Eagle career. Even the back injury itself leaves things unclear; was it bad luck? Not working out hard enough? Working out too hard? (how I hurt mine! tried to lift too much weight)

[PhillyPhreak54]

Center Jamaal Jackson can appreciate what Shawn and Stacy Andrews almost had this season. Jackson's brother, Jervonte, was a defensive tackle who was with the Eagles in training camp.

While Jervonte didn't make the team, it looked like the two Andrews brothers would get to play alongside each other on the same offensive line. That's not going to happen this season now that Shawn Andrews is on Injured Reserve because of his back injury. Even if the Eagles were to make the playoffs, Andrews couldn't return.

"I feel bad for him because he fought back," Jackson said. "In the position that he's in, you don't get to play next to your brother in the NFL often. I think he really, really wanted to come out and be here for his brother first and foremost, and for the team."

While it may not happen in 2009, Andrews' teammates have faith that he will return.

"He's going to get stronger and he'll be back," Stacy Andrews said. "I know without a doubt that he wants to keep playing. I want him to also. Why wouldn't he? We're both here."

And his teammates believe that it's Andrews' back that's keeping him off the field, not a lack of desire to play.

"I think he still has Pro Bowl capability in him. You just hope that thing works out for him as far as the whole back injury goes," Jackson said.

"I can see the pain when he gets up, sits down, all of that," Stacy Andrews said. "It's something that he's going to have to deal with and get it stronger."

The chance to play with Shawn was also enticing for Jason Peters. The two mauled people as teammates and roommates at Arkansas.

"I had high expectations to play with my old teammate," Peters said. "It didn't work out. Things happen. I'm just going to go forward and try to win a championship."

Now, the offensive line can focus on Winston Justice being the man at the top of the depth chart at right tackle. Jackson said that Justice has become a "fine offensive lineman" after the infamous Giants game in 2007 where all of the linemen should have been held accountable.

"He got that stigma on him from that one game. Let's not take away from what happened. We gave up 12 sacks that game," Jackson said. "It wasn't all his fault. There were a lot of things other guys could have done a lot better. You can't place that responsibility on one person."

Another player who might be out Sunday is quarterback Donovan McNabb. If Kevin Kolb starts, Peters said that he doesn't expect the game plan to change from the offensive line perspective.

"I think he's going to do well. We just have to go out there and step our game up. You can't really replace a Donovan, but Kolb's going to come in and do his thing," Peters said. "We have to step our game up another notch."

[PhillyPhreak54]

Eagles sources say Shawn Andrews is really hurt

By Bob Brookover

Inquirer Staff Writer

The Eagles' final answer on Shawn Andrews came Tuesday morning, when team officials decided to place their offensive tackle on injured reserve, putting an official end to the star-crossed player's season.

At some point in the near future, Andrews will jet off to Los Angeles and begin his second West Coast rehabilitation session in as many seasons as he tries to recover from a back problem that will have forced him to miss all but two games in the last two years.

Left behind in Philadelphia are his teammates, including his older brother, Stacy, and college friend Jason Peters, and a long list of questions about one of the most enigmatic sagas in Eagles history.

At the top of that list of questions is this one: How could everything have gone so wrong for such a promising young football player?

That one may actually have the most simple of answers. While all sorts of speculation has swirled about Andrews' desire to play the game of football, the Eagles say that a severe back problem is the only reason the two-time Pro Bowl guard's career is now in jeopardy.

"He had surgery," a team source said last week. "You don't just do the surgery to do the surgery. There was obviously something in there and it was flaring up."

Another team source indicated that the Eagles thought that Andrews would play in the season opener against Carolina last Sunday even as late as Thursday afternoon after he had sat out practice and the Eagles brought in Jon Runyan for a workout at the NovaCare Complex.

"When it first happened and he wasn't at practice, I talked to him and I thought he might be at practice the next day," the source said. "The next morning I saw him and he was walking like he was in a lot of pain."

The source admitted that Andrews is difficult to read.

"Some guys you say, 'How are you feeling, how long are you going to be out?' and you get very clear answers," the source said. "Shawn could be a little bit all over the place and hard to read. That made for some complicating factors."

Andrews was unavailable to comment for this story.

Though Andrews' answers may have left the Eagles confused at times, the source said it was the results of Andrews' last magnetic resonance imaging examination that led to Tuesday morning's decision.

"We tried to treat it again and it didn't get better, so he had an MRI and several doctors looked at the MRI and saw some irregularities," the source said.

One of the doctors that looked at the most recent MRI was Robert Watkins, the Southern California-based surgeon who operated on Andrews' back last fall.

"The conclusion was they didn't think he was going to be able to play," the source said.

And so Andrews landed on injured reserve.

The complexity of Andrews' situation and personality has fueled speculation about the former first-round pick's willingness to play in pain. All you have to do to find skeptics is log onto an Eagles fan site or read many of the comments online after a story is written about the tackle.

Some of that doubt was born a year ago, when Andrews did not initially report to training camp and then said it was because of a bout with depression, a very real disease that is invisible to anyone who sees Andrews only as a professional football player.

It also probably doesn't help Andrews that he was replacing Runyan, whose off-the-chart pain tolerance allowed him to line up for every game during his nine-year Eagles career.

Runyan had off-season knee surgery. Besides the Eagles, he has met with Kansas City and Buffalo, but he remains unsigned.

Andrews' agent, Rich Moran, said his client wants to play football.

"The truth is, he's a tough, gifted and phenomenal athlete," Moran said.

Moran pointed out that Andrews weighed 402 pounds when the Eagles drafted him and he made the effort to get to 365 pounds by the start of his rookie training camp. He further noted that his client has since reduced his weight to 335 pounds and kept it there the last couple of years even as he battled to return from a surgically repaired back.

The agent said Andrews diligently rehabilitated after suffering a fractured right fibula in his very first NFL game, in 2004. The best example Moran provided of Andrews' playing hurt was during the 2006 season.

In a Christmas night upset by the Eagles at Dallas, Andrews suffered a neck injury. He was listed on the injury report with a collarbone injury the following week, but he continued to practice and played in the Eagles' final regular-season game as well as the final two playoff games.

At halftime of the second playoff game, at New Orleans, he complained of neck pain, and the Eagles rushed him to the hospital.

"His eyes were red with blood," Moran said.

Near the end of training camp the following season, Andrews did become overly dramatic and equally enigmatic when he referred to an ankle injury as a possible "tearjerker" after visiting ankle specialist Robert Anderson in North Carolina. Coach Andy Reid became irked by the entire matter and described the injury as a high ankle sprain.

Andrews returned for the start of the season and was voted to the second Pro Bowl of his career.

But 2008 became a battle with depression, followed by an early-season back injury that has now cost Andrews the last two seasons.

It also has ruined the Eagles' plans for a rebuilt offensive line that included the Andrews brothers on one side of the line with Peters on the left side.

"I think we're disappointed with the outcome because the way it looked in the spring, we thought we had two of the best tackles in the league and it was going to be awfully tough to get pressure on our quarterback," one of the team sources said.

There was speculation that the Eagles signed Peters and Stacy Andrews to help Shawn Andrews' mental state after last year's battle with depression, but the Eagles reject that notion.

"I know people think that, but it's a coincidence," Reid said. "I went for the best players I thought were available at those positions. I absolutely would have done the same thing even if Shawn wasn't here."

The Eagles also say they have a good Plan B in place, with Winston Justice replacing Andrews at right tackle, but the jury will not reach a verdict on that for a while.

Stacy Andrews said it's difficult to watch his brother being bashed by skeptics.

"It does make me a little angry," he said. "People are going on about this and that because of the depression, and they think he's playing around because he missed training camp last year. Playing together is something we've been talking about for years. Why would he try to fake something knowing that I'm here now? I know he loves football. I don't question that at all. He's been playing since he was a kid."

Moran said he asked Andrews if he wanted to play football and got a two-word reply: "Hell, yes."

Now the question is whether Andrews will ever be able to play football again. The Eagles hope the answer is yes, and all indications are that Andrews wants to go through another year of rehabilitating his surgically repaired back, which will probably begin at some point this week after he visits Watkins again in Marina Del Ray, Calif.

"Is he down? Of course," Moran said. "Does he want to hang it up? No, he wants to train and play football again. He's never given me one inclination that he doesn't want to play football again."

[PhillyPhreak54]

Doctor: Shawn Andrews' back pain real

By Bob Brookover

Inquirer Staff Writer

Shawn Andrews visited Robert Watkins in Southern California yesterday and was told his back pain is real and not all that unusual for someone who underwent the surgery he had last year.

"He has flared up," the physician said in an interview with The Inquirer. "He does not have an injury to the nerve, and there is no bad sciatic, but he is real stiff, and there is a lot of pain in his back. As he is right now, he's unable to play football because his back is hurt too badly."

Watkins said no further surgery is required, but he plans to give Andrews at least one and possibly two cortisone injections in the near future.

"Then he'll go into the rehab program that focuses on core strength," Watkins said. "I don't anticipate any more surgery. That's not the current plan. He should start the rehab program by Monday."

Watkins said it's possible that Andrews will also require anti-inflammatory medication and possibly an epidural injection if he has problems during his rehabilitation. The rehabilitation will take place in Southern California near Watkins' office in Marina Del Rey. Watkins said there is no timetable for Andrews' recovery.

"It's hard to give an estimate because you don't know how he's going to respond to things," Watkins said. "As soon as there is a decrease in inflammation, we'll watch to see how he's doing in his rehab. He'll be doing an intensive core stabilization program with levels one through five. When you get to level five, the exercises become very sport specific. Sometimes guys get to a level then have a flare-up, and you have to back off."

Watkins said Andrews will be able to continue his football career.

"I'm still optimistic that the prognosis will be good, and he'll return to being a productive professional athlete," Watkins said, basing his opinion on 30 years of work with professional athletes. "That's my best judgment right now. He could have come in here and needed more surgery, but that wasn't the case. I think he'll respond to nonoperative treatment. If something changes, we'll change the plan."

Watkins performed microscopic surgery to repair a herniated disk in Andrews' back last October and was optimistic that the Eagles' two-time Pro Bowl offensive lineman would be able to return to the field this season.

"I was very, very optimistic in the off-season," Watkins said. "We set up a real good rehab, and he did very well working with the team and their trainers, as well as a rehab specialist here. I thought he'd be back having a productive year. But then it flared up once in training camp, and we thought we got past that, and then it flared up again."

Watkins said it's not unusual for somebody who has had a herniated disk to experience the problems Andrews is currently having.

"It's a very typical type picture," Watkins said. "The pain and the disability that he has is what people get a lot of times. He didn't enjoy the complete relief like we wanted for him. His pain is real, and it's hurting him."

[ice grillin you]

im actually one of the few that believes hes hurt but that sounded like doc was in an infomercial paid for by andrews selling his back pain to whoever will buy in...how many times are you gonna say "the pain is real"

how about everyone involved just shuts the farg up until his back doesnt hurt anymore and hes actually playing games

[PhillyPhreak54]

I think its real too. I doubt he's bullshteintin.

[SunMo]

i don't doubt it's real, i just don't think he has the passion for football to try and play through it.  he probably doesn't want to play unless he feels 100% good and won't try it otherwise.

[rjs246]

I'm sure his back hurts. He weighs 340 pounds and professionally hurls himself at 290 pound defensive linemen. At no point in his life should his body ever feel good. This is his job, if he wants to do it he has to know that it's going to hurt. If he doesn't want to do it he should stop pretending that he does.

[BigEd76]

more back surgery

[General_Failure]

Remember folks, cook your Andrews at 325 degrees, 15 to 20 minutes per pound today.

[Eagaholic]

remember to wash first and pat dry. handle carefully. at 15 - 20 min per pound should be ready for Christmas, or maybe next season.