Raiders fully expect Martavis Bryant to return this season

Usually when you hear the letters ACL, MCL, or PCL with regard to a player injury, it’s very bad news. It often is followed by a long rehab stint and surgery. Even those which may not require major surgery can have a player out a good amount of time. So, it was a logical assumption that when it was revealed Martavis Bryant suffered a PCL injury in week ten, his season was over. But the Raiders don’t think so.

Bryant has been out the past couple weeks with the injury, but has not been placed on injured reserve, and the Raiders are quite confident he will return this season.

Bryant has yet to practice the past two weeks since suffering the injury and is unlikely to be able to go Sunday against the Chiefs, giving him the four final games for his potential return.

Overall, he has been a disappointment for the Raiders who traded a third round pick to the Steelers during the draft to acquire him. It was always a bad trade to make and made all the worse after missing several days of training camp and an expected suspension caused the team ended up waiving him in the final roster cuts.

That suspension never came and they would bring him back after the season opener on a non-guaranteed contract. He hasn’t done much since then with 19 catches for 266 yards and no touchdowns.

Even after Amari Cooper was traded to Dallas, the team turned to Brandon LaFell as the top target. LaFell was lost for the season with an Achilles injury, but Bryant has been injured so he was not available and thus has not had the opportunity to step up.

“It’s just the reliability aspect,” said offensive coordinator Greg Olson. “He’s been injured, different reasons why he’s had to miss parts of games and so for us it’s more about accountability, reliability for a player like that. We think he’s got tremendous skills. It’s just about [doing it] more on a consistent basis.”

The sooner he returns the better for him, obviously. He still has to prove he is worthy of being re-signed after this season and he can’t do that from the training room.