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Here is a link to some highlight of a St. Louis Post-Dispatch story (via the Mercury News):
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...s/11633912.htm
Against all odds, Rams' Timmerman has stayed healthy
BY BILL COATS
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
ST. LOUIS - (KRT) - Adam Timmerman realizes that he's already beaten the odds. Many times over.
In a profession in which the average career lasts less than four years, Timmerman is preparing for his 11th NFL season.
He has played four seasons for Green Bay and the last six for the Rams. Timmerman, a guard, has played in four Super Bowls, made two Pro Bowls, earned millions of dollars and will qualify for a hefty pension.
Not bad for a seventh-round draft choice from South Dakota State who grew up in tiny Cherokee, Iowa.
Moreover, Timmerman has remained remarkably injury-free, particularly for an offensive lineman. He has a streak of 157 regular-season starts.
Still, Timmerman can't help but wonder if time, and the pounding of the NFL, finally is catching up to him. He needed just two minor surgeries during his first 10 years, arthroscopic procedures on an elbow and a knee. But Timmerman, who will turn 34 in August, needed three operations after last season: both shoulders and a foot.
"It's weird," he said.
He declined knee surgery.
"I feel a little something in there," he said. "But I really didn't want to have one more (surgery)."
Taking it easy
So instead of pumping iron and pounding roads to keep his conditioning up, Timmerman is focusing on rehabbing his 6-foot-4, 310-pound body.
Timmerman won't participate in the full-squad minicamp June 3-5. His goal is to be on the Rams Park fields when two-a-day practices begin in late July.
"That's kind of what we're shooting for, to be reasonably ready to do football stuff when it comes time for training camp," Timmerman said. "My foot doctor is kind of like, `Well, we'd like to maybe just make that one-a-days. We don't want to pound on it right away.' So it might be kind of phasing in at training camp, which would be OK, too."
While Timmerman's immediate objective is clear, to be in shape to make his 158th start in a row on Sept. 11 in San Francisco, his long-term outlook is murkier. He conceded that the recent spate of surgeries has heightened his concern about the effects of slamming into 300-pound opponents some 70 times per game over more than a decade and how that will affect him in the future.
"I thought about stuff like that more this year than ever," he said. "I really hadn't considered it. I was thinking to myself all along, `Hey, if I blow out a knee or something, my career would be over.' But I never really saw far enough ahead to think that things are just going to wear out. And I'm definitely starting to see some of that go on." . . .
Frightening future
"If you go to a retired players' convention, there are older retirees who walk around like Maryland crabs," Miki Yaras-Davis, director of benefits for the players association, said in an interview with Sports Illustrated. "It's an orthopedic surgeon's dream. I'm surprised the doctors aren't standing outside the door handing out their cards. ... Everybody comes out of pro football with some injury. It's only the degree that separates them."
It's a frightening prognosis, Timmerman acknowledged.
"I wish you could just look into a crystal ball and know how much this stuff's going to affect you when you're 50 years old," he said. "I want to be able to at least coach my son or something like that.
"You don't want to leave with nothing left."
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...s/11633912.htm
Against all odds, Rams' Timmerman has stayed healthy
BY BILL COATS
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
ST. LOUIS - (KRT) - Adam Timmerman realizes that he's already beaten the odds. Many times over.
In a profession in which the average career lasts less than four years, Timmerman is preparing for his 11th NFL season.
He has played four seasons for Green Bay and the last six for the Rams. Timmerman, a guard, has played in four Super Bowls, made two Pro Bowls, earned millions of dollars and will qualify for a hefty pension.
Not bad for a seventh-round draft choice from South Dakota State who grew up in tiny Cherokee, Iowa.
Moreover, Timmerman has remained remarkably injury-free, particularly for an offensive lineman. He has a streak of 157 regular-season starts.
Still, Timmerman can't help but wonder if time, and the pounding of the NFL, finally is catching up to him. He needed just two minor surgeries during his first 10 years, arthroscopic procedures on an elbow and a knee. But Timmerman, who will turn 34 in August, needed three operations after last season: both shoulders and a foot.
"It's weird," he said.
He declined knee surgery.
"I feel a little something in there," he said. "But I really didn't want to have one more (surgery)."
Taking it easy
So instead of pumping iron and pounding roads to keep his conditioning up, Timmerman is focusing on rehabbing his 6-foot-4, 310-pound body.
Timmerman won't participate in the full-squad minicamp June 3-5. His goal is to be on the Rams Park fields when two-a-day practices begin in late July.
"That's kind of what we're shooting for, to be reasonably ready to do football stuff when it comes time for training camp," Timmerman said. "My foot doctor is kind of like, `Well, we'd like to maybe just make that one-a-days. We don't want to pound on it right away.' So it might be kind of phasing in at training camp, which would be OK, too."
While Timmerman's immediate objective is clear, to be in shape to make his 158th start in a row on Sept. 11 in San Francisco, his long-term outlook is murkier. He conceded that the recent spate of surgeries has heightened his concern about the effects of slamming into 300-pound opponents some 70 times per game over more than a decade and how that will affect him in the future.
"I thought about stuff like that more this year than ever," he said. "I really hadn't considered it. I was thinking to myself all along, `Hey, if I blow out a knee or something, my career would be over.' But I never really saw far enough ahead to think that things are just going to wear out. And I'm definitely starting to see some of that go on." . . .
Frightening future
"If you go to a retired players' convention, there are older retirees who walk around like Maryland crabs," Miki Yaras-Davis, director of benefits for the players association, said in an interview with Sports Illustrated. "It's an orthopedic surgeon's dream. I'm surprised the doctors aren't standing outside the door handing out their cards. ... Everybody comes out of pro football with some injury. It's only the degree that separates them."
It's a frightening prognosis, Timmerman acknowledged.
"I wish you could just look into a crystal ball and know how much this stuff's going to affect you when you're 50 years old," he said. "I want to be able to at least coach my son or something like that.
"You don't want to leave with nothing left."
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