When the Raiders drafted Jermod McCoy in the fourth round of the draft on Saturday, they picked up arguably the most talented cornerback in the draft.
The issue with McCoy, as everyone is learning, is his surgically repaired knee that could shorten the timeline of his NFL career.
The expectation is that McCoy will be close to full strength in his first season, but no one seems to know how long a “bone plug” that was performed on his knee 15 months ago is going to hold up.
Prior to being drafted by the Raiders, ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler said he asked around the league for opinions on McCoy’s knee and the slight majority of the teams he asked said the Tennessee cornerback was off their draft board.
“After Day 2 of the draft, I checked with eight teams about Tennessee cornerback Jermod McCoy with a simple question: ‘Is he off your board?’ Medical concerns with his surgically repaired knee caused the top-10-to-12 talent to slide dramatically. Five said yes to the question; three said no. Las Vegas did extensive homework on the injury, and, at least as of now, the team is optimistic about his chances to play in 2026 and avoid a redshirt season or immediate surgery,” Fowler reported on Wednesday.
“Perhaps he needs a procedure sometime in the future, but the team is hopeful he can avoid that in the short term, with the caveat that it must get him in the building for the offseason program and see how he’s progressing. One rival team exec on the Raiders: ‘This felt like John Spytek’s draft.’ That’s considered a good thing. Pete Carroll’s influence was heavy this time last year.”
Unlike more common knee procedures, there isn’t a lot of precedent for “bone plug” surgeries in the NFL. It does, however, seem like most believe McCoy will eventually need another surgery that could knock him out for a full season.
At this stage in McCoy’s recovery, there most likely aren’t many doctors willing to offer an optimistic outlook on his long-term career, but one of the more encouraging statements on McCoy’s situation came this week from former Raiders’ O-lineman Marshall Newhouse.
“This is that balance of risk and reward. I’ve heard that he’s healed from the ACL. He could play this year,” Newhouse said on the Just Win podcast.
“The question is if he’s going to need another additional procedure that the rehab is 12 to 14 months and then there’s like a 20 percent chance, we won’t turn in the doctors here on that procedure… not working out. And so that’s a very big risk but one that you take with the 101st pick. So it’s interesting. Time absolutely will tell on this one.”
Newhouse made it clear he wasn’t reporting on the injury, but if McCoy’s chances of extending his NFL career are anywhere close to 80 percent, the Raiders should feel good about where they drafted him on Day 3 of the draft.
x: @raidersbeat
I had the same surgery over 20 years ago….I’m not an NFL athlete but I can say that if they did the surgery right, he’ll be fine. Better than he was before the surgery I would predict.
The ‘plug’ is not something you replace like a flat tire or something lol. It fuses to the rest of the knee bone, either the femur or tibia, depending on which bone they put it in.
We got a steal folks!