Green Bay Packers running back MarShawn Lloyd has been one of the NFL's trickiest injury cases over the past two seasons. Lloyd's hamstring has kept him out of the lineup for all but one game since being drafted out of USC with the No. 88 pick in the 2024 draft. It's unclear
As it turns out, the Trojans' medical team might've misfired on an injury and didn't heal it properly, causing his first two seasons in Green Bay to be lost.
Things may be on the mend for Lloyd, however. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Tom Silverstein reported that there is positivity within the organization that Lloyd could get healthy soon, as he continues to explore opinions.
"The Packers still have high hopes for Lloyd but until he can overcome the soft-tissue injuries that have plagued his short career, he’s not going to get on the field. Lloyd has met with more specialists to help figure out imbalances in his body that may be causing the hamstring and groin injuries that have sidelined him. It may all stem from a knee injury he suffered in college," Silverstein wrote.
Matt LaFleur on MarShawn Lloyd: 'The Results are Promising'
Packers head coach Matt LaFleur said on Thursday, via Jason Hirschhorn of The Leap, that the results of Lloyd's recent specialist visits are "promising." LaFleur did add the "We'll see" caveat, meaning that there isn't 100% certainty Lloyd will ever get right.
"We sent him out west to another group to try to get his body right. It sounds like the results are promising, but we'll see," LaFleur stated.
Certainly, that doesn't bode well for either USC's staff or Green Bay's scouts/medical team for not catching these issues sooner. A player with the career Lloyd has typically goes undrafted, with teams knowing it'll take time for injuries to settle; with the possibility they never do.
Fortunately, though, a relationship between the Packers and the University of Wisconsin-Madison was established after the NFL granted the university $4 million to conduct further studies into hamstring injuries. Lloyd's current teammate, Christian Watson, spoke about the experiences he had with his own hamstring issues during his visits with the university.
"For me, it really was the asymmetry between the legs," Watson explained after an OTA session back in March 2024. "It comes from a lot of things. Obviously, the issues I've had in the past with hamstrings, not fully recovering from those strength-wise. I've been attacking the strength side of it, trying to get that symmetry back and it's been huge for me. I feel really, really good. I gotta continue grinding at it."
Packer fans are holding out hope Lloyd can return to form, much like Watson was able to do, and provide Jordan Love with more help than Josh Jacobs and Emanuel Wilson have this season. There's still very much a need in Green Bay's RB room that Lloyd can fill if he ever comes close to his potential.
As LaFleur stated, though, we'll just have to wait and see what happens moving forward no matter how promising the early returns from the visits have been.