Being hurt doesn't help anyone's chances of making an NFL roster, especially if you happen to be a seventh-round draft pick. Scott Wells, the Packers rookie center is well aware of this and is doing his best to overcome a reoccurring elbow injury.
Wells has missed at least 10 practices because of soreness in his elbow and although he played in the team's first exhibition game against Seattle, he had to sit out Saturday's game against New Orleans.
In the fourth installment of Wells' training camp diary, the rookie out of Tennessee talks about moving out of the St.Norbert dorms, his injury and his chances of making the Packers' final roster.
Scott Wells: It definitely feels good to get out of the dorms. To be able to go home and be with my family is great, but it's a little tougher to get out of bed now. The first thing I did when I got home was take a nap in my own bed. The dorm beds were a little rough for rookies. As first-year guys, we don't exactly get the cream of the crop for bedding.
Some people are confused about my injury and exactly what is wrong. It's been very frustrating, but it's elbow tendinitis, it's not my bicep. The doctors called it global tendinitis, which means it's both sides of my elbow. It's something we tried to give some time to heal and we even tried to brace it. When that didn't work, Coach Sherman held me out for the game to see if more rest would help it heal.
Today I have the cast on, which also doesn't look like it is going to work too well. I'll probably end up going back to the brace. The cast limits my movement too much. It's kind of hit or miss on how to treat it and how to keep the swelling down. It flares up a lot and that is why they thought it was my bicep at first, because my bicep went flat and there was no muscle tone at all.
It scared me a little bit because the doctors thought I had torn my bicep tendon at first. An injury that like that takes a year's worth of recovery time. But then the MRI (magnetic resonance imaging test) showed that it was fine and it's just a bad case of tendinitis.
I've had two MRIs done to compare them. We just want to make sure they didn't miss something on the first one. They both came back fine. They explained to me that MRIs aren't 100 percent accurate but with two of them being pretty normal, we are just going to try to treat it.
I'm at the point now where I will do anything I can to get on the field. I mean, this is ridiculous. I thought I would try the cast today in individual periods, but it puts a lot of strain under my bicep, so we'll see what happens.
I do know this: I will be ready for Jacksonville. I'll be out there one way or the other. I can't afford to sit out another game. It's tearing me up inside, so I will be ready to go.
It was tough missing the New Orleans game. It was the first game I've missed in a long time with no chance of playing. It was hard standing there that long. I wanted to be a part of it, but couldn't. I hope that never happens again.
Fortunately, I don't think they will put me on injured reserve. It's not a long term injury and with proper treatment and the proper of amount of rest, it should go away. With tendinitis, there's not much you can do for it other than treat it and rest it. I don't see IR as a possibility, but of course I don't make the decisions.
It's just something right now that I'm going to have to go through. When I was coming back we would go through things full speed. Full speed periods of hitting never really gave it the chance to heal up. It was just calming down. The signs were going away and then coming back.
But right now, I feel really good about making the team. It feels great to be able to come back out here and participate. To be able to contribute at any level I can and go through practice without any problems, I think that will go along way in helping me make this team.
