Rams’ Johnson Is Out for Up to 3 Weeks : Arthroscopic Surgery on Right Knee Finds Only a Ligament Tear
Johnnie Johnson slipped into the black tunnel of anesthesia Wednesday morning without knowing what was at the other end.
“I was thrilled to wake up and not have anything on my leg,” the Rams’ free safety said by phone from his room at Centinela Hospital Medical Center.
He feared that he might see a large, cumbersome cast.
“That’s the first thing I looked for--to see if there was anything on there, and there was nothing but a bandage. That’s when I realized I was coming back.”
Ram surgeon Clarence Shields peeked inside Johnson’s right knee with an arthroscope to see how seriously it was injured in practice at Cal State Fullerton Tuesday.
His finding: A partial ligament tear but no cartilage damage. Prognosis? Out two to three weeks.
Coach John Robinson said: “The news is much better than what we’d supposed.”
Johnson, starting his seventh season, also felt a lot better than he did two years ago when he broke his left ankle in training camp and was on injured reserve for the first seven games.
“That was the same week,” he said. “In fact, it was the same day of the same week, the same morning practice, about the same time in practice.
“It happened on one of the last three plays. I just felt it the most on the last play. “It was weird. There was a collision and I was avoiding it. I went to jump over (other players). I didn’t feel it go. Contact didn’t cause it. It was just being off balance and making the wrong step.”
Ram Notes All of the healthy Ram veterans will participate in the non-contact skeleton passing phase of a workout with the Chargers at Anaheim Stadium tonight, but only reserves and rookies will mix in the live scrimmage, with the exception of reserve quarterback Steve Dils and rookie Hugh Millen. Dils is the longshot in the quarterback contest with Dieter Brock and Steve Bartkowski, but Coach John Robinson said: “I want him to have a chance. A chain of events could lead any of them to be in front.”