Jul
Durant expected to go vs Argos
Courtesy Regina Leader Post:
It was one thumb up from quarterback Darian Durant after the Saskatchewan Roughriders completed Thursday’s practice at Mosaic Stadium.
Durant conducted media interviews with his right hand close to his side. Durant bruised the thumb on his throwing hand after hitting a helmet during Tuesday’s practice. The thumb appeared swollen but Durant is optimistic that he should be able start in Saturday’s CFL game at the Rogers Centre against the Toronto Argonauts.
“Right now, it has a long way to go,” Durant said. “It’s better than it was (Wednesday) and that’s the main thing. As long as it keeps progressing by Saturday, it should be fine.”
There was some doubt in Durant’s voice, though. That may be because the thumb was bothering him after going through all of the repetitions with the first-team offence.
“At the end of the day, I’m still going to play,” Durant stressed. “It hurts when I take a snap but the main thing is gripping the ball. The swelling is in a place where it’s essential that I get the butt of my hand around the ball. We have a couple more days to get the swelling down. Once we get that down, the pain is bearable.”
Durant has had experience with the pain of damaged thumb. He had surgery on the same thumb while a junior with the North Carolina Tar Heels. In that instance, his thumb was also injured after hitting a teammate’s helmet.
On Thursday, he was able to complete some long passes, but encountered some problems with throws of shorter distances.
“On every play, I tried to make sure that I had my grip right,” said Durant, who guided the Riders to a 28-24 victory over the B.C. Lions last Friday in the season-opener for both teams. “When you try to aim the ball into a tight spot, it may not come out like you want it to. When you don’t think about it and do what you’ve been doing, good things happen.
“I just have to train my mind to not worry about the pain. When I did that, I made some good throws.”
Ken Miller, the Riders head coach, said Durant did well in practice with the damaged thumb. Wednesday’s practice was cancelled after 20 minutes when a thunderstorm rolled through the city. That rest also helped Durant, whom Miller expects to play Saturday.
“It may not be 100 per cent but there are still a couple of days,” said Miller. “He has made a remarkable recovery already. If he continues to recover like that for the next couple of days, he should be close to 100 per cent.”
Durant said the training staff will go through some aggressive treatments to get the thumb ready to handle the rigours of Saturday’s game. That means a great deal of ice while studying videos of the Argos.
“The main thing is to get it ready to play Saturday,” said Durant. “I wanted to let everyone know that they shouldn’t worry. It has made a big improvement from a couple of days ago.”
Durant said he’s not averse to taking medicine that will help him play Saturday.
“I’ll take anything that won’t make me drowsy,” said Durant. “It will be something to knock the pain out and I think we have something for it.”
