Falcons wide receiver Darnell Mooney suffered what the team called a shoulder injury on the first day of training camp, and for the rest of the summer coach Raheem Morris was vague about when Mooney would return. But it turns out Mooney suffered an injury that was more specific than just “shoulder” and is common enough in the NFL that the Falcons knew more than they were saying about how much time he would miss.
Morris admitted this week on 92.9 The Game that the injury Mooney suffered was actually a broken collarbone. It happened at the start of camp, and Mooney ended up missing all of camp, all of the preseason, and the first week of the regular season.
In his radio interview this week, Morris said it’s been a slow process for Mooney to build a rapport with quarterback Michael Penix, but they’re working on it.
“We got to get Mooney going. Mooney is getting caught up to speed coming off all the stuff,” Morris said.
Morris was then asked why Mooney hasn’t done more this season, and that’s when Morris finally acknowledged the broken collarbone had affected Mooney’s ability to get on the same page as Penix.
“There’s been no practices,” Morris said. “You don’t make excuses, you never talk about those things, but Mooney, we knew how this would work: He came back, he broke his collarbone on the first play of training camp. He missed all that time and came back the second week of the season. That was the first time [Mooney and Penix] actually practiced together. You start working those practices, you knew the first four weeks of the season would almost be like training camp for him. So you’re working those things in, you’re getting him going, you’re getting his legs back, and running fast, all those things.”
That the Falcons were intentionally vague about Mooney’s status shows once again how valuable inside information about player injuries can be to gamblers. Morris acknowledges now that the Falcons knew it would be a slow process for Mooney to get accustomed to playing at game speed with Penix.
“The first four weeks of the season was well expected and well known by us and what we knew would possibly be the reason why we would possibly have a slower start,” Morris said.
Any kind of injury information that is “well known by us” within a team is ripe for gamblers to try to get their hands on. The NBA is currently facing a gambling scandal in part because of inside information about injuries being shared with gamblers. The NFL should demand that coaches and teams be more transparent about injuries at all times, and not just wait until midway through the season to casually mention that the team knew a key player’s training camp injury was going to affect him well into the regular season.