Georgia absorbed its most serious injury of the preseason Monday. If it’s as bad as it gets, the Bulldogs are in pretty good shape.
Sophomore James DeLoach, who is slated to start at the strongside outside linebacker position known as “Sam,” suffered a thumb injury in practice on Sunday and was to undergo surgery at St. Mary’s Hospital on Monday. The injury, which occurred on his left hand, is not expected to sideline DeLoach but for a couple of days and will not prevent him from playing in the opener against Clemson on Aug. 31, coach Mark Richt said.
Freshman Davin Bellamy, who is also an outside linebacker, suffered the exact same injury on the exact same hand and will also undergo surgery on Monday.
“Well, you’ve got a lot of hand-to-hand combat in there and your digits get pushed back sometimes and get damaged,” Richt said following Monday’s practice, Georgia’s first in full pads. “So we’re going to clean them up with the surgery and then club them up to protect them. And they’ll be practicing relatively soon. You don’t miss an awful lot on that.
“We’re hoping by the time the game rolls around they’ll have about every finger and thumb free, at least the fingers will be free by then. But we’ll club them up for a while after surgery and still let them practice.”
Richt predicted the two linebackers will be unable to practice only about two to three days.
DeLoach, a 6-foot-3, 265-pound sophomore from Jenkins County, played a limited role in 13 games last season and finished with 4 tackles. But he has been the subject of much praise from coaches all year and expected to be a major contributor in 2013.
“He knows enough about what to do where I don’t think it will (be an issue),” Richt said of DeLoach missing time. “And he can get all the mental reps as well. So I think he’ll be fine.”
Bellamy, a freshman from Chamblee, had off-season shoulder surgery and wasn’t expected to contribute much early.
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