DETROIT – Dan Campbell offered his opinion on whether C.J. Gardner-Johnson could really return to the Detroit Lions soon, as the injured star hinted over the weekend.
Gardner-Johnson tore his pectoral in the second game of the season against the Seattle Seahawks. Initial reports kept open the possibility of a return sometime late in the season, but no concrete timeline was ever released.
This weekend, as the Lions were coming back to beat the Chicago Bears, Gardner-Johnson posted a celebratory Instagram Live and claimed he would return in a couple of weeks. At one point, he said, “Y’all got three weeks to get your s--- together,” likely in reference to the Lions-Bears rematch on Dec. 10.
He didn’t come right out and say, “I’ll be back for Week 14.” But his comments got fans excited about the possibility of getting one of the team’s best defenders back on the field.
On Tuesday, during an interview with Stoney and Jansen on 97.1 The Ticket, Campbell was asked about Gardner-Johnson’s optimism.
“Listen, I love (Gardner-Johnson), and I hope that this is, man, he’s going to heal his body, he’s going to will himself to be ready, but I just -- I don’t know if that’s going to happen in a couple of weeks,” Campbell said. “But, yeah, listen, I love the optimism.”
Campbell’s response doesn’t make it sound like Lions fans should expect to see Gardner-Johnson on the field in Chicago, but he didn’t shut down the possibility of an eventual return, either.
For now, we’ll have to wait and see. But getting Gardner-Johnson back would be a huge boost to a secondary that’s struggled the past couple of weeks.
