Jamal Adams’ shoulder will be a week-long Seahawks issue before his NFL playoff debut
Jamal Adams’ new shoulder injury is going to be a Seahawks issue through a shortened week into their first playoff game.
Yet does anyone truly believe the All-Pro safety who has never played in the NFL’s postseason, who played with one arm for weeks after injuring the other shoulder in November — who lit a victory cigar during a postgame press conference after Seattle clinched the NFC West — is going to sit this one out?
“He got hurt,” coach Pete Carroll said Monday, emphasizing on his weekly radio show with Seattle’s KIRO AM it’s a legitimate injury.
Adams’ pain came after he blitzed into San Francisco’s Jerick McKinnon during the fourth quarter of Sunday’s regular-season finale.
“I haven’t seen him today,” Carroll said Monday, the players’ day off for the week.
“He’s real disappointed. He wants to play and he wants to get out there. He hasn’t been to the playoffs and he wants to be a part of it, and all that, so it kind of crushed him. He’s very emotional and all, and he’s going to deal with it.
“We’ll see what happens (Monday) and the next couple days, see how he feels and all. But he got hurt, and he handled it, wanted to go back in.”
Adams injured his left shoulder blitzing San Francisco quarterback C.J. Beathard. McKinnon, the 49ers’ running back, slammed his shoulder into Adams’ on a blitz-pickup block. Adams tried to play on but eventually had his arm dangling at his side walked off the field to the sideline.
He missed 12 defensive snaps Sunday. Ryan Neal replaced him for most of the final plays of the game.
Can’t see Neal replacing Adams in a playoff game.
After he got hurt Adams went into and out of the blue observation tent behind the Seahawks’ bench so quickly the tent barely had gone up before it went down again. Adams threw his helmet in frustration on the sideline after the Seahawks’ medical staff told him he would not be going back into the 49ers game. That was at least as a precaution so he can play Saturday in his first career postseason game when Seattle (12-4) hosts the Los Angeles Rams (10-6).
“We had to take his helmet away and all of that on the sidelines, because he wanted to fight with his guys,” Carroll said Monday.
“So we’ll see what happens. I can’t tell you right now. I don’t know.”
Sunday night, before the team flew home from Arizona, Carroll said: “The early stuff from the trainers is that he’ll play next week. But we’ll have to see how he does getting through the week.”
This story was originally published January 4, 2021 at 10:38 AM.
