Cowboys’ Damone Clark says medical issue was discovered by Dallas ahead of 2022 NFL Combine

Large danger, sure, but additionally a probably large reward. That is the best way to view the Dallas Cowboys resolution to pick linebacker Damone Clark within the 2022 NFL Draft, after the previous LSU standout was nonetheless out there within the fifth spherical as a consequence of a medical challenge. That challenge concerned Clark’s neck, with the 21-year-old having undergone spinal fusion surgical procedure following the invention of a herniated disc within the pre-draft course of — on the 2022 NFL Mix. 

Coincidentally, or not a lot, it was the Cowboys’ medical workers that discovered the difficulty, and it’s now they who will oversee his rehabilitation again to the sphere. As he joins his fellow rookies and returning veterans on the crew’s headquarters to actually dig into his rehab, he thinks again on simply how “surreal” all the chain of occasions actually was.

“The loopy factor is, on the mix, Dallas’ medical workers was the one which informed me,” Clark stated, through the crew’s web site. “After they informed me, I used to be shocked. I am like, ‘Whoa, perhaps y’all bought the flawed particular person.’”

Sadly for Clark, they had been spot on and, as such, he made the troublesome resolution to bear surgical procedure, regardless of feeling no sick results of the disc challenge on the time. 

“I performed the entire 12 months [at LSU] and felt completely advantageous,” he stated.

That is possible true, contemplating he began in each sport for the Tigers in 2021 and was electrical all through — happening to additionally take part within the Reese’s Senior Bowl in Cellular as properly. Clark went from being named First-Workforce All-SEC final season to the very best linebacker on the Senior Bowl, his inventory hovering forward of medical checks on the NFL Mix, to a serious revelation that required surgical procedure to restore and subsequently brought on his draft inventory to plummet; all in a span of 4 months.

His surgical procedure happened on March 24 however, justifiably, he first needed to substantiate the Cowboys analysis.

“I went out and bought a second opinion, and Dr. [Robert] Watkins stated the identical factor,” Clark stated. “It is loopy that that is the crew that drafted me. So I already really feel snug right here.”

Clark’s harm is one the Cowboys have seen earlier than, albeit not fully related, when former first-round decide Leighton Vander Esch suffered a neck harm that price him seven video games in 2019. Vander Esch would return to play in 10 video games in 2020, lacking a number of as a consequence of a fractured collarbone unrelated to his neck harm, and performed the whole thing of the 2021 season for Dallas, together with 16 begins final season. Now again with the Cowboys on a one-year deal, he and Clark will presumably take the sphere collectively in some unspecified time in the future in 2022, though the Cowboys is not going to rush the rehab course of on the latter.

As for head coach Mike McCarthy and others within the teaching workers and entrance workplace, grabbing Clark within the fifth spherical was a no brainer, particularly contemplating the added perception possessed by their medical workers — reminiscent in some ways of the Jaylon Smith choice in 2016 (although there was no comparable scenario to Smith’s on the time).

“On the harm entrance, going by way of the expertise with Leighton and there have been a few different comparables,” stated McCarthy. “I imply yeah, that was undoubtedly a part of the dialogue main as much as the choice [to select Clark]. … He is been on the Zoom name conferences. Very, very brilliant. Has actually good command and understanding. 

“He appears to be like nice. His rehab, you would not know he was coping with something, simply taking a look at him and watching him transfer. However he is been very spectacular.”

Clark joins fellow former LSU linebacker Jabril Cox in Dallas, Cox himself working to return from a torn ACL suffered in 2021. The 2 spent solely a short while collectively as Tigers, however will now be regarded upon to tandem with All-Professional linebacker Micah Parsons in anchoring the youth motion on the place for the foreseeable future. And, all issues thought of, all of it occurred “for a cause” based on Clark, and he is trying ahead to creating good on the Cowboys draft funding.

“I am simply blissful they discovered it, and Dallas nonetheless picked me up. I am blissful to be right here.”