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Kansas City Chiefs starting RT Mitchell Schwartz has been on injured reserve since Week 11 and dealing with a back injury since Week 7. After a Week 15 game that saw QB Patrick Mahomes battered for three sacks and 11 hits or knockdowns, fans want to know if Schwartz is any closer to making his return.
When Chiefs HC Andy Reid spoke to the media on Monday, he’d have you believe that Schwartz is doing better.
“Yeah, he’s actually feeling a little bit better,” Reid said. “Not all the way back, but he is feeling a little bit better and we’ll just see I mean, we will take it day by day. He’s a great communicator so we know he wants to play but just want to make sure you know that he’s ok and I kind of leave that up to the docs and Rick (Burkholder) on that and then obviously Mitch.”
What Reid doesn’t know is if Schwartz will be healthy enough to return from injured reserve and play come the postseason.
“I don’t know that,” Reid said. “We’re just kind of taking it day by day, week by week literally, and so we’re just seeing how he does here. Hopefully, it calms down by then or whenever and he can get himself back out there. I mean, that’s what we’d like, but we’ll see how that all goes.”
Right now, it sounds like the team is remaining optimistic that Schwartz could eventually return from this mysterious back injury that has caused problems for the better part of the season. However, Reid doesn’t seem to have an expectation that Schwartz will return at any point during the regular season or the postseason.
At this point, it’d probably be safe for fans to expect that they won’t be seeing Schwartz until next season, if at all. Remember, the salary cap reduction in 2021 could make Schwartz a cap casualty. The absolute worst-case scenario would be that we’ve seen Schwartz play his last snap in a Chiefs uniform.
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