RENTON — In case a rare home loss wasn’t bad enough for the Seattle Seahawks, Sunday’s game against Dallas might have also taken a significant toll on Seattle’s defense going forward.
Most notably, the Seahawks might be without middle linebacker Bobby Wagner for a while.
“He’s got turf toe, and we’ll have to just take this in the next couple of days and see what that means, but he’s banged up,” head coach Pete Carroll said.
And no, Carroll didn’t give a timeline on Wagner, but if you’ve been around the Seahawks coach long enough, you know “banged up” is a term he doesn’t throw around lightly.
While players are sometimes able to play through turf toe depending on the severity, that injury, which is much more serious than its name might imply, can require a long layoff or surgery. Last season, left tackle Russell Okung needed surgery and missed eight games while on short-term injured reserve. In 2010, center Max Unger missed 15 games because of a turf toe injury suffered in Week 1.
Asked if Wagner’s injury was similar to Okung’s, Carroll said, “Could be, yeah. We’ve got to wait and see, we’ve got to assess that and figure that out.”
It is still possible that this is an injury Wagner could play through, but Monday’s news certainly wasn’t encouraging for the team’s leading tackler. If Wagner misses any playing time, the Seahawks could either plug rookie Brock Coyle in at middle linebacker, or perhaps more likely, move K.J. Wright to middle linebacker and play Malcolm Smith at weakside linebacker.
In Wagner, Wright, Smith and Bruce Irvin, the Seahawks essentially have four starting linebackers for three spots, so it’s a position with enough depth to survive an injury, but it’s hard to understate how important Wagner has been for Seattle’s defense this season.
Herald Writer John Boyle: jboyle@heraldnet.com
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