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Before joining our Access Vikings team, Dan Wiederer covered Atlantic Coast Conference basketball for the Fayetteville (N.C.) Observer and was named North Carolina's top sports columnist in 2010. His previous reporting experience includes covering the Chicago Bears. Follow him on Twitter @StribDW.


Mark Craig has covered football and the NFL the past 20 years, including the Browns from 1991-95 and the Vikings and the NFL since 2003. Since 2008, Craig has served as one of the 44 Pro Football Hall of Fame selectors. He can be followed on Twitter at @markcraignfl.


Childress expects Rice to miss at least 8 weeks

Posted by: under Vikings, Brad Childress, Anthony Herrera, Brad Childress, Percy Harvin, Sidney Rice, Vikings training camp Updated: August 24, 2010 - 4:29 PM

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Vikings coach Brad Childress confirmed Tuesday that Sidney Rice had undergone an arthrosopic procedure on his hip Monday in Vail, Colo., and said the team has not decided if the wide receiver will be put on the physically unable to perform (PUP) list to start the season or if he might end up on season-ending injured reserve.

"Really it would be hard for me to tell you how long that thing is going to take," Childress said following the Vikings practice at Winter Park. "It varies. I would think probably at least eight weeks before we're talking about doing anything. He'll come back here and rehab."

Rice is currently on the active-PUP list, meaning he counts against the 80-man roster. The Vikings could keep him on the PUP list to begin the regular-season, meaning he wouldn't count against the 53-man roster but would have to miss the first six games.

There had been discussion that Rice might have made a business decision in electing to have the surgery -- he is due $550,000 this season in the final year of his rookie contract (not exactly enough to want to play through pain) -- but Childress didn't go along with that.

“I don’t know that I’d term it anyway," he said. "As I talk to Sidney, I can’t feel what he’s feeling. In the end it’s up to him whether he wanted to have that procedure or whether he could press through. You guys saw him run out here the other day and move around [on Friday] and obviously he felt like it was more than a nag [and] to where he couldn’t slough it off. He wanted to remedy it by having the procedure.”
 
There has been some mystery surrounding Rice's injury and exactly how much the Vikings knew about it. Childress said Vikings head athletic trainer Eric Sugarman visited with Rice in March in Florida dealing with what he termed a "subsquent medical issue" and that Rice didn't mention a thing about his hip at that point.
 
"Really the first thing we found out more about the hip was the day before the mandatory minicamp [in June]," Childress said.
 
Asked if he was satisfied with how this played out, Childress said: “No, I’d really be satisfied if he was out here running around on the football field. But that’s not the reality of it. Conservative approach. You can second guess it and say, ‘Geez, he could be back and [have had it] done.’ We’ve got a decent hip guy in Dr. [Chris] Larson, who consulted with the Tennessee Titans team physician and consulted with Dr. [Marc] Philippon [who is one of the leading hip surgeons in the country] . You lay all those options out there and it’s not like I’m trying to sell him one way or the other. The athlete knows what he has to have done.”
 
Although Rice said early in training camp that two of three doctors he saw suggested surgery, Childress said that actually was not correct and that at some point Rice had corrected himself. "[Those doctors] said that they would probably treat it less aggressively. Could he have put his hand up and said, ‘No, let’s do it.’ Yeah, he could have. But usually you err on the side of before you open somebody up guys want to see if it rectifies itself. I’m not familiar with two of three. I know he said that and then he came back and amended that.”
 
Etc.
  • Childress said that wide receiver Percy Harvin did not practice Tuesday because he was getting "a couple more tests" after he collapsed on the practice field last week following the onset of a migraine headache. "We would hope to get those [tests] done in relatively quick fashion but it’s not like making a reservation at a hotel or restaurant," Childress said. "There are people in front of him. We’re just not going to have him practice until he finishes with the medical board.”
  • Right guard Anthony Herrera played a few series at center against the 49ers on Sunday and said he hopes to get more work at that spot. “I don’t have a problem with it,” he said. “For guys like us, it adds value to you. The more you can do in this league, the longer you’re going to stay in. I take it as challenge and I’m going to go out there and work hard, do what the coaches ask of me and get it done.”
 

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