The return of left tackle Jedrick Wills Jr. this past weekend was supposed to be a boost for the Cleveland Browns. However, Wills and his offensive line mates struggled to protect Deshaun Watson as the star signal caller was sacked eight times and hit a total of 17 times.
While the struggles up front weren't all Wills fault, he certainly had his fair share of struggles in what was his first start since November of last year. Asked about what he thought about his performance against the New York Giants, Wills expressed confidence in what he put on tape.
"I felt fine. I feel like I was doing pretty good," said Wills. "There were a couple of plays I'd like to have back, like always. You can't always play perfect, but I felt like I played pretty good."
In fairness to Wills, Sunday's outing was his first game action since suffering a season-ending MCL injury in Week 9 of 2023. After having arthroscopic knee surgery to fix the ailment back in December, the 2020 first-round pick spent the offseason rehabbing the injury ahead of the 2024 campaign. He started training camp on the team's physically unable to perform list and was activated to the active roster on cutdown day in late August. Then he made his official return in Week 3.
After months of anticipation and preparation, Wills said he got reanimated to the game pretty quickly.
"Just one play," said Wills. "It's real like, you go out there the first play it's gonna be a little, you're just getting back into it. But the first play, you'll see, it wasn't my best and then the rest of the game was completely shutdown."
Wills wound up exiting the game in the third quarter after tweaking his knee again. This time the 25-year-old was fortunate enough to avoid serious injury though. The same can't be said for a number of his fellow offensive line-mates.
Pro Bowl guard Wyatt Teller went down with an MCL sprain and the team has since placed him on the IR. He'll have to miss four games at least. Reserve tackle James Hudson III also left the Giants game with a shoulder injury. Meanwhile, one day prior to kickoff veteran right tackle Jack Conklin was trending toward making his 2024 debut as well, but suffered a setback in the form of a hamstring issue.
The epidemic of offensive line injuries is something Wills has never experienced before.
"It's unheard of, it's crazy," he said. "We're all working to get back when we can, do what we can for the team. But it's tough, people have to fill in and step up. That's the name of the game."
