St. Louis Rams running back Todd Gurley is a candidate for NFL Rookie of the Year, but it appears he won’t have the chance to add to his numbers in Sunday’s season finale against the San Francisco 49ers.
Gurley didn’t practice this week because of a foot injury suffered late in last Sunday’s win over the Seattle Seahawks, and he has been in a boot all week.
Listed as doubtful but not out on the injury report, head coach Jeff Fisher said after practice Friday, “You can read between the lines there.”
While Fisher and the Rams are hoping to get to .500 with a win Sunday, they don’t believe it’s worth making the injury worse by playing him.
“We’re thinking about the long-term future and he’s got an issue he’s dealing with,” Fisher said. “We’re still doing tests, but the difference between him playing and making things worse could be the difference between six to eight weeks of rehab during the offseason. Right now we got really good news and good results, but it’s doubtful that he plays. He’s had a little setback with the foot, so I just don’t want to set him back any more. It just makes sense for the future of the organization.”
Fisher did say no surgery will be necessary just “a couple of weeks” of rest.
Gurley will finish the season with 1,108 yards rushing on 229 carries (4.8-yard average) and 10 touchdowns. He added 21 receptions for 188 yards. His combined yards from scrimmage of 1,296 yards currently accounts for 29.5 percent of the team’s total yards. He accomplished that despite missing the first two games of the season and getting only nine yards on six carries in his season debut.
Tre Mason will start against the 49ers and be backed up by Benny Cunningham and rookie Malcolm Brown, who was signed to the roster from the practice squad Thursday. Mason has just 163 yards on 57 attempts (2.9-yard average) this season.
Of Mason, Fisher said, “He’s looking forward to this. That’s why he’s here. Unfortunately, if you look back through the year, our perfect world was 15 and 12 carries apiece. We wanted to carry it at least 25 times, 27 times and split them. We were unable to do that, either getting the ball back or struggled on third down and struggled with opportunities. But Tre is in great shape right now. He’s fresh and he’ll go. Benny will go and we brought Malcolm up and you may even see him carry the call a little bit.”