Alexander reaggravated his injury when he “felt something” against the Bears
According to The Athletic’s Matt Schneidman, Green Bay Packers cornerback Jaire Alexander revealed on Thursday that the knee injury that he’s been dealing with has been a PCL tear. Alexander injured his knee at the end of the Packers’ Week 8 game against the Jacksonville Jaguars before missing Week 9’s action against the Detroit Lions. After the bye, Alexander attempted to play against the Chicago Bears but dropped out of the game after just 10 snaps.
According to head coach Matt LaFleur, the plan was always for Alexander to be on a pitch count, but that plan fell through when Alexander was unable to finish the first half. Instead, cornerback Carrington Valentine played a season-high amount of snaps opposite of Keisean Nixon — as Valentine displaced Eric Stokes as the team’s number three outside cornerback.
Alexander was a limited participant in practice throughout last week. To start this week, he’s been a non-participant in the Packers’ two practices. The assumption, at this point, is that Alexander won’t be able to suit up against the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday. So you can go ahead and bet that you’re going to see a healthy dosage of Nixon and Valentine at Lambeau Field this weekend.
According to Alexander himself, via Schneidman, the corner’s knee injury was reaggravated versus the Bears.
“I just tried to give it a go … I went out there and s–t, all I could really give was 10 plays and then it — I felt something. If you know how (posterior cruciate ligaments) work, it don’t just get done in three weeks, so it just needed more time. I reaggravated it going back out there and only doing 10 plays, so now we just trying to get my knee back right.”
According to the Cleveland Clinic, mild PCL tears only take “10 days to heal,” but it sounds like Alexander’s injury might have been more than mild. The fact that the Packers didn’t push Alexander toward surgery, as he was seen riding an exercise bike on the side of practice on Thursday, is a positive sign.