During Thursday Night Football, in which the Cincinnati Bengals beat the Jacksonville Jaguars 24-21, viewers watched Jacksonville’s starting wide receiver DJ Chark get carted off the field on the first drive of the game after getting rolled up on while blocking.
The injury didn’t look good, but I was hopeful Chark only suffered a high-ankle sprain. However, Chark wasn’t so lucky as it came out later that night that he fractured his left ankle.
While we don’t know the exact fracture that Chark suffered, we can assume that based on the high-ankle sprain mechanism that he likely had a fibula fracture in combination with a tear of his syndesmosis. Which if you remember from my article on high-ankle sprains, is the ligament that holds the tibia and fibula together near the ankle joint.
Reports are that Chark will likely have surgery which confirms his fracture was likely unstable and that his 2021 season is over. Chark ended his 2021 season catching seven passes for 154 yards and two touchdowns in basically two full games.
Long Term Outcomes
This injury is likely similar to the same injury Odell Beckham Jr. suffered in October of the 2017 season. OBJ came back to play in 2018 posting 11 receptions for 111 yards in Week 1. Beckham played 12 games in total averaging 6.4 receptions, 88 yards, 0.5 TDs per game.
Although Chark does not have the same pedigree as OBJ this is positive in his chances to return to form and be ready for the start of the 2022 season.
When we look at the research, it too confirms this return to sport timeline. One very large systematic review looked at 356 ankle fractures that encompassed all types of ankle fractures (as we technically don’t know the exact injury) and found that of the 356 fractures, all returned to sport by 51 weeks.
A second study looked specifically at NFL athletes with fibula fractures from 2000 to 2014 which included 197 isolated injuries. Of these 197 fibula fractures, 54% of the injuries required surgery and resulted in an average of 124 days or nearly 18 weeks before return to sport.
While these fractures occurred in isolation meaning they likely did not include the syndesmosis injury that Chark appeared to suffer, we can use this data paired with the OBJ injury timeline to safely assume that Chark will be ready by Week 1 of the 2022 season.
This is important for dynasty owners and DJ Chark as he will be an unrestricted free agent in 2022.
Rest of Season Implications
The assumed beneficiary of this injury appears to be WR, Laviska Shenault who saw his normal gadget player average depth of target jump from 5.0 to 13.4 yards in the absence of Chark. His target share also jumped from 17% to 33% as he went on to finish the night with 6 receptions (7 targets) for 99 yards.
Granted this is a very small sample size but it was encouraging given the shrunken route tree that Shenault was running before this injury.
When you truly look at the numbers though, my concern is that the majority of his air yards and average depth of target change came because of his 46-yard, broken play reception. Removing that play, his other targets resulted in an average depth of target just north of eight.
I doubt we see a major role change for Shenault even following the Chark injury due to his previous usage and my distrust of Urban Meyer. But, Shenault should still see a boost in his target share and has the talent to become a more prolific fantasy producer due to the injury.
Coming into Week 4, the target share breakdown amongst the three wide receivers was as follows: Marvin Jones 24.6%, DJ Chark 19.3%, and Laviska Shenault 17.5%. Shenault finished Week 4 with 29.2% target share.
I would expect Marvin Jones, despite a down Week 4 (three receptions, 24 yards) to command a similar target share as the first three weeks, with Laviska Shenault bumping up with a consistent low 20’s share. I also believe new addition Dan Arnold will get steadily more involved in this offense as he gets his playbook expanded.
Conclusion
DJ Chark should be dropped in all redraft leagues as his injury is season-ending. However, long term, Chark should return to his previous form in time for the 2022 season. Given the unknown of his landing spot as he is an unrestricted free agent, Chark is a hold right now as he recovers from this unfortunate injury.
-Zach Pavlichek, PT, DPT
Feel free to reach out on Twitter @Zachpav42 with any injury questions or concerns.
References
- Del Buono, Angelo & Smith, Rebecca & Coco, Manuela & Woolley, Laurence & Denaro, Vincenzo & Maffulli, Nicola. (2012). Return to sports after ankle fractures: A systematic review. British medical bulletin. 106. 10.1093/bmb/lds039.
- Werner BC, Mack C, Franke K, Barnes RP, Warren RF, Rodeo SA. Distal Fibula Fractures in National Football League Athletes. Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine. September 2017.
