The New Orleans Saints offense took a huge hit on Tuesday after further evaluating the high-ankle injury suffered by wide receiver Michael Thomas late in their Week 1 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero and Ian Rapoport reported that Thomas is expected to miss several weeks while recovering after it was initially said that he hoped to gut out the pain in next week’s game with the Las Vegas Raiders.
It’s a big loss, even if Thomas’s importance wasn’t reflected on the Week 1 stats sheet (he went 3-of-5 for 17 yards). He’s not the NFL’s reining Offensive Player of the Year for nothing, and without him the Saints will have to rely more heavily on pass-catchers like Alvin Kamara and Jared Cook, as well as free agent pickup Emmanuel Sanders.
We’ll know more in the days ahead, once the Saints have released their first Week 2 injury report on Thursday. NFL teams are allowed to return players from the injured reserve list after three weeks this season, so if Thomas doesn’t land on I.R. it could suggest the Saints expect him to be game-ready sooner than that window would allow.
