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Fluke pectoral injury while lifting. But cue all the 'told ya sos.' Betting he's out for the year.

poor guy, he's done

I don't know if this is an "I told you so", but when you sign injury prone guys its not exactly a big surprise when stuff like this happens. I at least expected him to make it to the regular season. Sheesh.

I don't agree that "this happens" when you sign an injury prone player. It's one thing if it's Byron Leftwich or Peria Jerry that have a steady history of ankle, knee, or lower leg joint injuries, but it's another thing when a player gets hurt lifting weights.

But I already know that people will make the very superficial connection that because Tatupu has previously been injured, which includes a torn pectoral, and is currently injured, thus the two things are linked. But if you were to go a few inches below the surface and examine the nature of the current injury, there is no grounds for such linkage. No different than someone that has a history of several fender benders one night swerves off the road to avoid a deer running across the highway and winds up wrapped around a tree in a ditch. And to the superficial eye, such an incident was "bound to happen/inevitable/not surprising" given their previously questionable driving record.

I've heard he's only going to miss the beginning of training camp. I'm not that worried yet but it's a bit concerning.

It doesn't seem like that Emmitt. Dr. James Andrews is a surgeon. You don't go see a world-renown surgeon if you're just going to miss a couple of weeks.

I think he'll be out for the year, or at least a couple of months.

https://twitter.com/JeffSchultzAJC/stat ... 6652767232

Gee, who couldn't see this coming?

Guess we better make that call to M Peterson. This guy is going to take his 2.75 million and ride pine all year.

Tapoopoo couldn't even make it out of camp. WTG, TD!

Like I said, superficial.

Noun

fluke (plural flukes)
1.Either of the two lobes of a whale's or similar creature's tail.
"Tapoopoo injured his fluke while lifting weights in what could have been described as an impending injury"

Fixed that for ya

Pudge their is nothing superficial about Tatupu not even being on a NFL Roster last year..... Now how often does a past
pro bowl player not be kept by one of the many teams in the NFL; AND he's still reasonably young??

I don't think I've made one post about him because I knew either by injury, or just poor play he'd never amount to anything again
in the NFL. I believe his explanation for last year was " I JUST DIDN'T GET PICKED UP BY ANYONE; IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME"
now you can probably find other reason's he's given because its a question he just can't answer .

The people who don't get picked up usually have good reason's why they were out; mainly they can't hack it anymore; So now your making excuses for him and the injury isn't the main point. The point is why were we putting any faith in a linebacker who nobody else wanted last year.... Lets hope Dent is everything I hope he can be; and my memory may be wrong; but it seems like
you were the one giving Thomas D. so much grief over the Dent pick.

Subtract the money Tatupu will get and your big campaign to get rid of Loften won't look so great either; if he has a decent year but I don't fault that; you
couldn't know we'd pick up a guy who's been an all pro with injuries that nobody wanted last year.... Going around saying that Tatupu
not playing this year is superficial; is wrong; your just making a partial case and I can't understand why??

No, I was and remain to this day not a big fan of the Akeem Dent pick. I don't think he is/was going to be a better MLB than Lofton, and thus not an upgrade to our LB corps. And thus I think at that point in the draft, especially after we gave up what we gave up, he was poor value in the draft. But at the same time, despite that belief, I do believe Dent is capable of being an effective starter. And I'm probably more eager than most to make him a starter, and thus give him ample opportunity to prove me wrong.

As for the superficiality, I've said why already. People will simply look at it and see that Tatupu has been hurt the past three seasons, and so it was only inevitable that he would be injured for a fourth year. Yes, his injury history probably makes him more likely to suffer an injury than one of the other 2880 average NFL players. But for the superficial thinkers out there, it's pretty simple: he was hurt before and he's hurt now, so the must be connected somehow regardless of the mechanism of injury being vastly different. But to most, the mechanism of injury doesn't matter, all that matters is the injury. That is superficial thinking.


Because a healthy Tatupu is as good a player as Lofton is, and could be had for less than 17 cents on the dollar. The risk/reward was in our favor.

Riddle me this...How many MLB's his age get injured for three consecutive years, spend a year OUT of the league, then return to form and complete a season and actually pay off vs getting injured again?

I believe you said even if he played 8-10 games as well as Lofton then the deal was ok when I questioned if he could even complete the season...Hell, this Girl Scout Cookie couldn't even make it to contact drills!

If he had not injured himself weighlifting, he was going to get injured in camp anyways, or at the very least by the mid point of the season.

Saying this was a fluke accident is like dropping your dog off at Camp Vick and being suprised when it come home without any ears and on three legs

So you say.


I don't know of any examples. Now some players have missed 2 seasons and come back fine (e.g. D'Qwell Jackson), but players like Dan Morgan and Ed Hartwell who both missed similar chunks of time due to injury, but never returned to form.

Hindsight is 20/20. And you'll have people like yourself say that this was inevitable. Why? Because his sitting out last year means that his pectorals become more likely to tear when he's benching? He sat out last year because of knee injuries. But does that mean that all of a sudden all of his bones/muscles become brittle?

No, that wouldn't make any sense. But it won't stop people from making those superficial connections. The reason why Tatupu wasn't signed last year was because there was a perception that he couldn't be trusted due to durability concerns and age. And now that he is hurt again, it seems like that perception has become reality.

Yes but he only played in 5 games in 2009. No the perception was probably a fact; (based on every team not wanting him);
and its a fact today, regardless of what any of us wish!!

It will not surprise me that letting Lofton go becomes one of the teams huge mistakes as other
teams run right over us.....I think there's nothing worse than getting beat by the run!! Contrary to popular opinion it
does happen.

Dent better be ready week 1...

you answered your own question, Sir Pudge.

"I don't know of any examples."

What I gleaned from the article posted elsewhere was 2 things: he gets hurt alot, and he thought about 'hanging it up'.

Not a good combo for a return to the NFL. It has been my experience that guys who sit out a year or even two ( even younger, healthier guys) more often then not have 'issues' when they do return. And not just with injuries: with reaction time, adjusting to the pace of the game, coverage, etc.

So it's not 'hindsight' at all, it's common sense. I didn't think he would get injured in the weight room, but I was pretty certain he was going to get injured on the field. Now TatuBooBoo can hang it up next season 2.75 dollars richer

It's like saying 'If Matt Ryan goes down, Chris Redman is going to struggle'.

Now why would I say that? Because the last time it happened, he struggled. I havent seen a vast improvement on the OL, he is a year older. So if it happens, is that 'hindsight'? Of course not, it's common sense.

Now maybe Redman could step in and light up the place. Then I would just be 'wrong', but I would be wrong based on what I've seen and what I've read.

I understood the risk/reward variable with the Loafer. I also understand the rick/reward variable with Redman. In my opinion, they are both mistakes waiting to happen. Only one already did. Lets hope Ryan stays on the field so my other 'prediction' will ever come to fruition.

And I think I suggested at one point kicking Crowder's tires, but it is kinda the same thing. But there, I thought his familiarity with the coaching staff might help a little, but really, it's not that much different. I think Crowder would not make a whole season, either.

Oh well. Let's hope someone makes a Dent this year.

It won't happen. But if it does, it won't be because we let go of Lofton. It'll be because Peters is overrated DT, and Babineaux is on the decline. Lofton was vastly overrated as a run defender. Not to say Lofton didn't impact vs. the run, but the key reason why the Falcons run defense has been so stalwart the past few years is Jonathan Babineaux, not Curtis Lofton.


True on your latter point.


By "sit out" I'm assuming you're only referring to players that were not on NFL rosters for a season as opposed to guys that missed an entire year due to being on IR. And if that is the case, then you're right because generally speaking the guys that aren't on NFL rosters are so because of significant reasons, as many people have pointed out. And there were significant reasons why Tatupu was not on a team last year. But IMO, the difference between Tatupu and any player that "sat out" last year and a player that is on IR for an entire year is largely superficial. Were the Falcons more mistaken by putting trust into Tatupu this year as the Texans were last year with DeMeco Ryans who was coming off an Achilles injury from the year before? Does the fact that Ryans hadn't missed a game in 4 previous seasons make his Achilles less of an issue? Does the fact that he was 26 when he ruptured his Achilles, versus Tatupu being 28 when he hurt his knees make a huge difference?

Perhaps these are all indeed factors. But we aren't privy to any of the medical information that could/should sway us one way. But the perception is vastly different for whatever reason, and IMO those are superficial ones.

I don't agree with your Redman comparison. You're using Redman's past performance to determine that in the future he'll struggle. In the case of Tatupu, you're basically suggesting there's this "dark injury cloud" that hangs over him just waiting to strike him down. The latter is essentially a gut feeling, while the former is an intellectual one based off the fact that you (like myself) don't have a high opinion of Chris Redman's skillset/ability.

Now part of our point of disagreement here is based on my worldview, which is one that most of what happens in everyday life is essentially random events, that we as humans tend to subsequently assign meaning to as part of our attempts to make sense of the world around us. And I think this Tatupu injury is just another example of that. When you look at the specific injury that Tatupu suffered, you should conclude that he was no more likely to suffer that injury than any of the other 88 players on the roster. The fact that he previously had a pectoral tear in 2009 really doesn't factor into it, because when you look at the history of pectoral tears among NFL players, there is rarely a second occurrence (thus why i call it a fluke injury). Now interesting enough D'Qwell Jackson missed 2 seasons because of pectoral tears, although I believe the 2nd one was the result of the 1st one not properly healing. But we know that wasn't the case with Tatupu, because he played an entire season after his pectoral tear without incident (besides the knee injuries)

You say it was inevitable that he was going to get hurt. I don't agree it was inevitable, but I do agree that his odds were higher than your typical NFL player because of his injury history. But I don't think this specific injury was that inevitability coming to fruition because as I said, he is no more susceptible to this specific injury than anybody else in the league or on this team. Throughout this off-season, I never indicated that I expected him to play in all 16 games. I too wasn't optimistic that he would make it through the entirety of this season completely healthy. But at the same time, I understood that could easily mean he plays in 0 or 15 games. And how many games he does actually play, like EVERY OTHER player in the league is based around random variables.

And for the record, the contract of Tatupu pays him $750,000 in base salary this year and $600,000 bonus, meaning that he'll only collect $1.35 million from the Falcons (if he's on the roster), and only count $1.05 million against our cap this year. And if he cut him, we'll only have lost the $600K bonus (saving about $450K against this year's cap). So again, the financial commitment was minimal. Contrast that to Stephen Nicholas, who we guaranteed $6 million to when we signed him last summer, or the roughly $4 million in first year salary we gave Mike Peterson as part of his two-year contract in 2009. Or David Hawthorne or Curtis Lofton, both of whom were guaranteed around $8 million from the Saints.

Now for the record, I'll say that from the jump, I was in the "Let's sign London Fletcher" camp.

so what I take from this is that were better off having him get injured NOW as opposed to LATER..gotcha

I would have just signed Peterson to the lowest possible price, since that is what we are going to do anyways...Or get a real playmaker ( *cough*) but then we couldnt rush to resign Redman and our longsnapper.

I'm not sure I follow your logic. So we're saving money by paying a guy who never played a down for us instead of paying someone who will actually make a tackle on the field of play this season?

No, fun gus that's not my point. It would have been better if we had gotten some production from Tatupu than nothing at all (presuming he's out for the year).


Just stating Tatupu's contract status. Fun gus said we pissed away $2.75 million largely because a few weeks ago, I said that was around how much we paid him for the first year of his deal. But since then, more details of his contract have been release, and he signed a 2-yr. $3.6 million deal instead of the originally reported 2-yr. $5.75 million deal.

I'm just posting his contract info so that people understand what I mean about low risk/high reward. We're not investing very much money in Tatupu. And if he was return to his pre-knee injury form, then that would be a virtual steal at that price. If not, then we're not risking much because of his relatively low salary, the fact that we have Akeem Dent on the roster, and the fact that we could always go out and sign a veteran like Mike Peterson, E.J. Henderson, etc. to fill in if need be in a pinch.

Out for the year:

http://blog.atlantafalcons.com/jayadams ... re-season/

I think they're right, he'll never play a down...

"Tutupu still going to be a Leader from the Bench"
July 24,2012 Day Jaddams, FB.S. New Services

It may seem to the outsiders, that Lofa Tatupu has made his last impact on the NFL. According to Head Coach Mike Smith, nothing could be further from the truth.

" Lofa Tatupu is a LEADER. In Tatupu's first three seasons, he led the Seahawks in tackles. He was voted to the Pro Bowl for the first three years of his NFL career..While we are saddened and dissapointed by this fluky, unfortunate and completely unpredictable turn of events, we are confident Lofa's Veteran Presence will be there on the sidelines, every play of every game"

Coach Smith went on to add " Look, this organization doesn't ride and die on one player only, we are a team. As a teammate, I can think of none better then...Wait who was that again...Lofa...Oh Yeah. The Samoan guy!"

"Chris Redman may get tired holding that clipboard.. This is a good situation where he can help. While his twice torn pectoral will prevent him from actually holding the clipboard, he has a nice, big lap. A strong lap that shows great lateral surface and is powerful enough to handle the weight of your typical NFL playbook".

Coach Smith may well be right: while it is true that after Tatupu inked his 42 million dollar deal with the Seahawks in 2008 ( with 18 million guaranteed, making him the sixth highest linebacker paid in the league) he injured himself and never truly regained his form, he does seem mentally prepared for the role of Bench Leader.

"Im just thankful to Coach Smith and Thomas Smirnoff for taking a flyer on me. Last year, I was honestly considering opening my own Papa John's franchise. I guess now that I've torn my pecs again, I wont be tossing any pizza dough up in the air. But that's okay, I got a little over half a million in the bank right now! But I'm gonna work for that money. If they need someone's lap to hold that clipboard, I will be right there. Don't count me out yet, Someone is in need of a player to hold that windbreaker?: Im your man! I had two years experience in this, I can still be a contirbutor to this team".

Thomas Dimitroff commented " this is why we seek out good character, high motor guys like Lofa. Sure, they might get a little banged up, but they are more then willing to go the extra mile, and do all the public relations stuff required of a professional NFL franchise. You can plan to see him at Falcons Plaza, but please:no high fives, we still have him under our insurance.

The linebacker duties now fall to local 'guy done good' Akeem Dent, who was a player at the University of Georgia, and an old tired guy from Florida.That doesn't seem to matter to owner and devastatingly handsome man, Arthur Blank.

"I think Kareem could be an integral part of the Atlanter Falcons...He brings a certain homegrown quality like Keith Brooking, who was another one of our local heores who played hard every game. Especially the ones when he was dressed out with a big, ugly blue star on him. I look forward to a long and beneficial relationship with Amin....It is his time to Rise Up'.

So in the words of this columnist, I implore you not to worry about the recent linebacker depth. One thing you can count on, this front office has a plan, and they are completely on board with the coaching staff. The new coordinators will get the most out of each and every one of the players.

Even the one's on the bench.


www.ruadunce.com