Gordon Monson: Utah quarterback Cam Rising’s injury is a puzzle inside a riddle wrapped in a knee brace

Utah quarterback Cam Rising’s on-the-brink-of-return status has been a puzzle for months straight up until this very moment, as he admitted on ESPN 700 last week that his knee injury suffered in the Rose Bowl was worse than had been made known publicly. A clean, standard ACL tear might have, maybe, meant he would be leading the Utes on the field by now. Rising revealed this week he blew the whole thing out. ACL. Meniscus, MPFL, and MCL.

It was an admission, a clarification that won’t fix the Utes’ offensive issues, but it might take some unnecessary stress off the shoulders (and knee) of one of the best to ever play the position at the U.

You can let go of the hope that had turned into expectation of a miracle. Frustration can fade.

We should try this transparency thing more often.

Under the best of circumstances, an ACL tear after successful reparative surgery takes the better part of a year to heal, sometimes longer. Add in other damaged ligaments and the process gets more complicated. There are rare exceptions where the healing and rehab go quicker, but that’s not the way to bet.

There’s the problem: That was the way the Utes made it seem to bet in the run-up to the season’s start and in subsequent weeks. It was weeks ago that Kyle Whittingham informed the media that Rising was being cleared to practice, a full go in preparation for his competitive return.

Is that what Whittingham truly believed?

Is it what Rising believed?

I don’t know.

But it is what fans came to believe.

And now, Rising reveals that these are not the best of circumstances, that his knee’s injury and recovery are multifarious, making it sound as though it could be a while yet before he can actually play. How long is a while? Another unanswered question.

He shouldn’t even attempt to play if the joint is not whole. Everyone would and should agree with that.

But that’s not the way it was represented to everyone on the outside.

There always are unanswered questions when it comes to a player’s injury, often because nobody knows with exactness how an individual injury will mend. We get that.

But that game within a game clutters a situation like Rising’s even more – straight to the point where a quarterback as respected as the Utah star feels the heat from the frustration of fans who are eager for his return, to the point where he has to defend himself as an athlete legitimately trying to return to action, as opposed to, say, preserving himself for a better shot at the NFL.

Let’s back up here. Any time news surrounds an injury, trust is the single most important aspect to the deal. Usually coaches say the timeline rests in the hands and the judgment of the doctor, even more so than the player. Doctor knows best, right? But when the coach, in this case Whittingham, is pronouncing in a postgame news conference in front of microphones, cameras and notepads that a player, especially a significant player on whom so much production depends, is cleared to practice, it sure appears as though the season could be on the verge of a substantial boost.

Rising means that much to the Utah offense, a group that despite four victories in five games has struggled mightily, at times disappearing on a defense that has done what it could to hold the team’s bits and pieces together. Everything will be OK when Rising returns. That was what people who care deeply about Utah football were led to believe, what they wanted to believe. When, when, when, when, when.

When?

Meanwhile, the Utes’ quarterback room was tilting and tattered. Whittingham had to be aware of what was and is obvious.

There were teases for good hope, or, rather, was it all deception? Rising dressing for warmups before games and next thing, showing up on the sideline in street clothes and a baseball cap. He’s close, thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis close. Close enough to be padded up and out on the field temporarily.

Now Rising says his knee was messed up badly, blown up, worse than anyone [on the outside] really knew.

He said he’s trying, working hard to get back.

“It was a big surgery,” he said. “And it’s not an easy comeback. I’ve been working my tail off.”

The muck in the mystery stirred in all of that is this: It leads to conjecture and all kinds of speculation about the truth being as badly damaged as the knee.

Nobody, again on the outside, was told how severe the injury was until Rising said what he said on Thursday.

If a policy were in place at Utah, like similar policies being implemented at schools such as LSU and inside the Big Ten, and certainly among teams in professional leagues, where the status of players is made known in advance, an athlete like Rising would no longer be playing Whack-a-Mole in satisfying suspicions among the public wondering what in the name of Carlos Boozer’s hamstring is going on?

Fair or unfair, there are questions bouncing around here, there, everywhere, because the truth is shrouded in Whittingham’s current stated policy/strategy of not discussing player injuries with any specificity unless they are season-ending.

The coach is hardly alone in his approach, but that muddies the picture in a way that is disadvantageous to the afflicted athlete and frustrating for those who want to see him play and who want to know the truth concerning him.

Hiding the truth as a means for a coach to put an opponent in the position of having to prepare or not prepare for an athlete is antiquated and silly. Or to create an excuse for ineptitude at a position is shallow. Or were there other motivations? Just be transparent, as best as possible, eliminating the B.S., the conjecture. This isn’t the typical case of a doctor being held to personal HIPAA requirements, although sometimes officials use that as an excuse not to be forthcoming.

Meanwhile, so many eager outsiders don’t know whether to be accusatory or trusting, or something in-between.

We do know Rising is a football warrior, a team leader who’s always previously offered what he’s capable of giving. “I’m grinding and doing everything I possibly can,” he said. “And even the fact I’m going out there and practicing, I’m ahead of schedule.”

What’s the schedule now?

Whittingham said in August that Rising would be a game-time decision to play in the season opener against Florida. If the truth is the first casualty of war, it might also be the first casualty when a star quarterback is injured.

“… Nobody wants to be out there on the field grinding with those guys more than me,” Rising told ESPN 700. “But at the end of the day, it’s my body.”

And maybe “no body,” including Rising’s, knew the whole truth about the extent of the injury — not him, not his doctor, not his coach, not his family, not his representatives, concealed as it may have been in the variables of the human condition. But, the way it’s unfolded, maybe they all knew the truth, everyone but the fans.

Now those fans, most of whom, as mentioned, want to believe and believe in Rising, are left to wonder who knew what when and who knows what now, leaving the quarterback to play as much defense as offense.

The only certainty is that there has been much uncertainty about Rising and the Knee That Ate Salt Lake City. The truth these days is hard to find — especially when it’s cloaked and delayed — in a lot of places, the Eccles Football Center being one of them.

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