00:00This is the Injury Report, presented by NYU Langone Health.
00:05The Giants came away from Houston with an overtime victory, but it came at a cost.
00:09Running back Tyrone Tracy Jr. suffered a hamstring injury that has landed him on the injured reserve.
00:14General Manager Joe Shane says the injury isn't season-ending,
00:17but Tracy won't be eligible to return until Week 13 against the San Francisco 49ers.
00:22So, how serious could this injury be, and what will it take for Tracy to get back on the field?
00:26Those are the questions.
00:27And joining us to break it all down is NYU Langone Sports Medicine Orthopedic Surgeon, Dr. Spencer Stein.
00:33You see him there. He's with us now. Dr. Stein, how are you doing?
00:37Hey, I'm doing well. Sorry to be talking about injuries here, but it is what it is.
00:42It is what it is. It's what we do. We talk about injuries on the Injury Report.
00:45And Dr. Stein, you just heard me talk about it. Tyrone Tracy Jr., he suffered a hamstring injury during the
00:50Giants' win over the Texans last Sunday.
00:52For fans who hear the term hamstring strain, what exactly happens to the muscle and why are running backs particularly
00:58vulnerable to this type of injury?
01:01Yeah, so hamstring or a group of muscles on the back of the thigh, the hamstrings help stabilize and move
01:06the knee as well as the hip joints.
01:08And it is particularly injured in high-level sport activities. Running backs get it. Wide receivers get it.
01:17The injury happens from an eccentric contraction. So it's basically a negative. It's when the muscle is lengthening while it's
01:24contracting.
01:24And those high-impact, high-energy sports, they just happen to get a high rate of injury of this muscle
01:31group.
01:31And we see that a lot in football, as you mentioned there. And the Giants, they have placed Tracy on
01:35injured reserve.
01:36But that doesn't necessarily tell us, Dr. Stein, how severe the injury is.
01:41So how do doctors determine the grade of a hamstring strain? And what can an MRI reveal about the extent
01:47of the damage to the hamstring?
01:49Yeah, you got it right there. I mean, the MRI helps a lot. It's not everything, but it can help
01:54grade a hamstring injury.
01:55Hamstring injuries are typically graded one through three, one being a mild sprain of the muscle, two being tearing of
02:03the muscle,
02:04and three being complete tearing and disorganization of the muscle fibers.
02:08And the return to play varies depending on how bad that muscle injury is.
02:12It's also where the muscle injury is. So if it's pure muscular or the mid-substance, they typically heal a
02:19bit quicker.
02:20If it's closer to a tendon, the length of recovery is a bit longer.
02:24That's actually where I was going to go next when I asked you, because as some people may know, not
02:28all hamstring injuries are the same.
02:30So the location of the injury, whether it's in the muscle itself or closer to a tendon, that can affect
02:35the recovery timeline.
02:36And I'm also assuming potential for complications, correct?
02:40Absolutely. I mean, muscular injuries typically heal. That's a good thing. Muscle has a lot of blood supply.
02:44It heals typically on its own. I mean, with therapy, there's things that can be done, like injections, platelet, poor
02:51plasma is one way of treating it.
02:54But it's just time a lot of the times. The tendon, though, that gets more concerning.
02:58So tendon injuries have a longer return to sport and sometimes actually need surgery.
03:04Yeah. And so that's it. Where the location of it is matters so much here.
03:08Walk me through the process, if you can.
03:10When an NFL player suffers a hamstring injury significant enough to require time on injury reserve, as is the situation
03:16here, is here.
03:17What does treatment look like during the first couple of weeks and how soon can that player begin rebuilding strength?
03:23Well, the first couple of days is just quieting it down, treating the muscle injury, letting it letting it cool
03:29off, so to speak.
03:30Then over the next one to three weeks, it's a slow buildup, getting motion back, getting strength back.
03:35And then the return to sport is when you have full strength, full motion, no pain.
03:40But during this process, we have to be careful not to re-invoke injury, not to have a recurrence of
03:46injury.
03:47Right. Because as we know, hamstring injuries do have a high rate of recurrence.
03:51Yeah, we do know that. So that brings us to this, what we heard from Giants general manager Joe Shane.
03:56He said Tracy's injury isn't season ending, so Giants fans can relax on that,
04:00and that he'll first be eligible to return in week 13 against San Francisco.
04:04So from a medical standpoint, how encouraging is that timeline?
04:10And what specific tests or milestones would the medical staff need to, or would he, I should say,
04:16need to clear before you as a doctor would feel comfortable putting him back on the field?
04:20I mean, that's overall really reassuring, because when we're saying on a closer to four weeks timeline recovery,
04:25it means it's likely a more minor injury.
04:28Of course, things change depending on how it goes during the recovery.
04:32And yeah, the milestones are getting full motion, full strength, being able to run, jog, sprint.
04:40Then it involves non-contact drills, full contact drills, and then it's a full stepwise return to full sports.
04:46All right, we will see if Tyrone Tracy Jr. is able to hit those milestones and return back to the
04:52field,
04:52hopefully by week 13 for Giants fans.
04:56That is Dr. Stein with NYU Langone doing a wonderful job for us here on Injury Report.
05:00Dr. Stein, appreciate you so much. Thanks for breaking it all down.
05:04Really appreciate it. See you soon.
05:05See you soon.
05:06See you soon.
