From Yesterday
Bulger, Holt Hope to be Ready for Seattle
Monday, October 31, 2005
By Nick Wagoner
Senior Writer
While the stars have been away, the Rams have rediscovered something that had eluded them for three weeks: winning.
With a bye week to rest and heal, Pro Bowlers Torry Holt and Marc Bulger will get plenty of opportunity to get better in time for the Nov. 13 tilt against the Seahawks in Seattle.
But, is their return necessarily a good thing?
“I don’t want to come back because I don’t want to screw up the chemistry,” Holt joked. “I told them you guys are doing so well, I don’t want to screw anything up. A couple of fans made some comments… I said (the team) has done a fantastic job. It’s very exciting and very pleasing to see how well they responded and how well they are playing as a group.”
Of course, the Rams will take Holt and Bulger back with open arms. After all, Holt led the NFL in receiving yards when he injured suffered a grade 2 PCL sprain against the Seahawks on Oct. 9 and Bulger led the league in passing yards when he suffered a sprained shoulder against the Colts on Oct. 17.
Both players expressed great joy about how the Rams responded in their absence as well as the absence of receiver Isaac Bruce and defensive end Leonard Little. Armed with a week to rest and another week of preparation, practice and treatment, though, it appears the Rams will get Bulger and Holt back in time for the all-important divisional game against rival Seattle.
Bulger, in particular, was adamant about his return to the Rams next week.
“It will just be a pain issue and I can’t hurt it worse now,” Bulger said. “I think after this week it will be strong enough. As long as I can deal with the pain, I think I will be all right. We’ll take it easy this week and Monday we’ll have a day and Tuesday off again and then full bore back on Wednesday.
“I know for sure I’ll be back.”
Bulger did some throwing last week, but admittedly regressed some as he tried to push forward. He estimated that he was at about 50 percent throwing last week and still didn’t retain full range of motion.
Bulger will spend part of this week in St. Louis working out and doing some light throwing. He and Holt have made plans to workout together Tuesday morning, which will probably be the extent of Bulger’s throwing before he takes off to watch his West Virginia Mountaineers take on Connecticut in football on Wednesday night.
While it was hard for Bulger to watch the Rams play without him, his pain was eased by the fact that St. Louis was able to grab a pair of wins.
“It made sense,” Bulger said. “Especially now that we won, I am glad we took it off so I can get back close to 100 percent next week.”
As for Holt, things look promising, but he stopped short of proclaiming himself in for Seattle as Bulger did.
Holt actually played against Indianapolis a week after suffering the injury against Seattle, but that didn’t help him get better and he has struggled to gain his footing and has had the knee give out on him when he tried to run.
The sprain kept Holt out against New Orleans and Jacksonville and relegated him to cheering his teammates on and dishing out advice on the sidelines.
“When I came back from the Indianapolis game I was running and it would give and it would give again and I just didn’t feel comfortable with it,” Holt said. “I wouldn’t have been of any service to this football team or myself. I didn’t think I could help. I could be there and be a presence, but I wanted to be there and help and be involved. I didn’t feel I would be that good at doing that.”
While many of Holt’s teammates will spend the majority of the bye week on vacations and relaxing, Holt will spend his time attempting to get healthy. He went through a number of workouts Monday afternoon and reported positive signs from his exercises.
“Today I was able to run and do some cutting and did some things that were exaggerated on some drills with the knee to see what type of burst and acceleration and what type of strength and see how stable it was,” Holt said. “Those things I did do felt good. Then I did a full workout as well. I think today was probably a very good day as far as mentally trusting the knee and trusting that the rehab has been working. Overall, it was a good day. I made more progress.”
Holt stops himself just short of saying that he will definitely be back in time for the rematch with the Seahawks, but that is the goal.
“I am shooting for the Seattle game,” Holt said. “I think this bye week is going to be very beneficial.”