Myles Garrett suffered no structural damage in his left shoulder; is ‘sore’ and day-to-day, Kevin Stefanski says

#Browns Myles Garrett, #NFL Defensive POY candidate, on feeling something pop in his left shoulder pic.twitter.com/sbEX8rB356

— Mary Kay Cabot November 27, 2023

LOS ANGELES — The Browns got good news Monday on Myles Garrett’s left shoulder after he underwent an MRI here.

Coach Kevin Stefanski said Garrett is sore, day-to-day, and should be good to go for Sunday’s game against the Rams in Los Angeles.

Garrett suffered the injury during Sunday’s 29-12 loss to the Broncos and left the locker room in a sling. He wasn’t able to lift his arm, put on his shirt by himself or zip his carry-on bag one-handed.

“I felt a pop during a run play,” Garrett said after the game at his locker , where he wore a black sling and his white blazer draped over the shoulder. “I know it was a long play. I don’t remember what a play it was.”

The Browns flew to Los Angeles after the loss for a week of practices at UCLA before their game against the 5-6 Rams here on Sunday, and Garrett underwent his exams out here.

It’s not yet known if he’ll visit L.A.-based world-renowned shoulder specialist Dr. Neal ElAttrache, who performed Deshaun Watson ’s shoulder surgery here last week to repair the fractured glenoid bone, which is in the socket.

Garrett said he didn’t fall on the shoulder.

“No,” he said. “Just trying to snatch off the block. I remember it just making a little pop.”

He looked to be in pain after a 24-yard run by Samaje Perine in the third quarter that led to a field goal, but isn’t sure when it happened. He also seemed to be ailing after chasing down Russell Wilson on a 9-yard run in the first quarter, when he reached out and spun him down.

But he acknowledged it could be a continuation of the shoulder injury that he mentioned on Friday in the locker room, the one he said “felt terrible.”

“Might be about the same,” he said. “Looking like it now.”

It’s also the same shoulder in which Garrett suffered a sprained AC joint last September when he flipped his Porsche multiple times. It’s unknown, however, if the two things are related.

But Garrett has no intentions of calling it quits on the season, just like he refused to last season after suffering multiple injuries in the one-car accident. He knows how much his team, which is still the No. 6 seed in the seven-team AFC playoff race, needs him.

“I’m not going to come out unless it’s already falling off,” Garrett said. “I want to win just as much as the rest of these guys. I see the determination in their faces every time we go out there. And I’m not here to let them down. I’m giving them every ounce I’ve heard I’ve got. I don’t care how I’m feeling.”

Generally, when a player feels something pop, it’s serious. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow felt something pop in his wrist two games ago and underwent season-ending wrist surgery. But it wasn’t as bad as Garrett feared.

Tied for second in the NFL being T.J. Watt with 13.0 sacks, Garrett has a bona fide chance to win NFL Defensive Player of the Year this season even though it’s secondary to his goal of leading the Browns to the Super Bowl in his seventh season. Even with Watson out, Garrett and the rest of the Browns believe they can still win a championship.

He insisted the shoulder injury, regardless of the extent, wouldn’t keep him off the field.

“I’ve played through things that should’ve sidelined me before and I’m going to continue to fight and I’ll do what’s best for the team and for myself,” he said. “But we have high hopes for this season and what we want to do. And nothing like this is going to hold us back or me back. We’re going to find a way to win.”

He indicated he’d try to forge ahead regardless of what the doctors told him to do.

“I’ve heard it before,” he said. “I’m going to do what’s legal and ethical and I’ll be out there to play it if that’s the right thing to do.”