Take the Money and Run
BEDARD: After suffering a Lisfranc fracture in your left foot in Week 7 last season and missing the final nine games, do you regret your 38-day preseason holdout?
MAURICE JONES-DREW: No, not at all. To me, it’s shocking that people blame players for holding out, but never blame the team for cutting people. It’s a two-way street. Before that, I had been performing at a high level for seven years. Even last year, I was leading the league in rushing before I hurt my foot. That had nothing to do with the holdout. It just sucks that the public sees it as a negative thing when it happens all the time; it’s why people go on strike. If you feel you deserve more, you need to ask for more. And if you feel that you don’t get the answer you want, then you have to show why.
BEDARD: Doctors told you after the surgery that you’d have to learn to walk again, do you worry that you might not be the same player?
JONES-DREW: You always have doubts, but I just want to keep pushing. When I say ‘walk again,’ it’s walking normal, because I didn’t want to walk heel to toe. Once I did that, it became the same with running. Those things take a long time. I don’t have problems with my foot at all. It’s my ankle I have problems with, because I’ve have had a bad ankle before. And being immobilized in that boot didn’t help. That’s been one of the toughest things to get through. I should be back for training camp come August. The only time I’ll be back is when I feel like I’m back to what I’ve done before. I feel like I’ve progressed so well that I’ll have the opportunity to do that again.
BEDARD: Can Blaine Gabbert be a franchise quarterback?
JONES-DREW:
