David Bakhtiari confirms season is over but feels doctors have identified the problem and he will play next year
Tom SilversteinGREEN BAY – Six days after undergoing arthroscopic surgery to confirm a specific cartilage issue with his left knee, Green Bay Packers left tackle David Bakhtiari walked into the locker room without a brace, crutches or a cane.
It’s part of the cruel reality Bakhtiari has faced the past couple of years.
At some point in the future, he will have another arthroscopic surgery that will end his 2023 season but potentially end his painful journey back to the player he was when he tore his left ACL in a December 2020 practice.
“The human side of it, it took a lot of stress, a lot of time on my end,” he said Friday. “But the clarity is to know that we're fine, we finally know what the problem is. And we can address the problem. That's the, I guess, glass-half-full part of the scenario.
“So that's where we're at. That's the pill I have to swallow.”
Bakhtiari spoke with reporters for more than 30 minutes, answering all questions about the medical aspects of his knee except for when he’ll have his next surgery and the procedure by Brian J. Cole, a renowned Chicago orthopedic surgeon who specializes in cartilage restoration.
He also dove into the toll it has taken on him emotionally and why he refuses to give up, despite being 32 years old and about to undergo his fourth surgery on the knee. Since recovering from the ACL repair and the removal of about 10 to 15% of the cartilage in his knee, Bakhtiari has been in and out of the lineup, constantly dealing with pain and fluid buildup.
Every time the doctors thought they had solved the problem, some other symptom would resurface and Bakhtiari would be back in the same place. It happened again after he played 55 snaps in the Chicago Bears game Week 1 and, after consultation with Cole, Los Angeles-based surgeon Neal ElAttrache and one other specialist, it was determined the femoral condyles − two rounded prominences at the end of the femur − were causing the problem.
“I'm a symptomatic individual for this specific injury, and I need to fix that,” Bakhtiari said of it continually causing him problems. “And it's just unfortunate. Getting a bunch of opinions. I even went all the way over to the East Coast to talk to another doctor, and talking to Brian, I think we are at a point where we collectively understand what the problem is.
“It is just very unfortunate, because in my knee and how it is, it's basically like sandpaper when it rubs. It's just not smooth, which is creating a lot of fluid. And, you know, I've been dealing with a lot of the friction for a long time. And that’s where you see I’m constantly in and then out, I’m out and then I’m in.”
Bakhtiari said he would not be able to return to the field this season and his hope is that he would be ready for the start of training camp. Once the surgery is completed, he will have a long rehabilitation ahead of him, but he said he’s ready to tackle it full steam.
Due to make $21.4 million next year and count $40.5 million against the Packers salary cap, Bakhtiari said he understands it’s possible he could be playing somewhere else next year. But he said everything is on the table and his focus is on returning as one of the best left tackles in the NFL.
“I know I can still play and I can still play at a high level and I want to give that to an organization,” Bakhtiari said. “And to me, I think the greatest achievement other than the personal financial freedom that this game gives is to win a Super Bowl. So that one I would love to have, and that does definitely drive me.”
Bakhtiari indicated the initial injury, which he said occurred when he took a wrong step in practice, caused damage to the condyles, but he said doctors had no way of knowing whether that was going to cause him problems in the future.
He said the condition of his condyles doesn’t cause the symptoms he was having in every person and, because it requires a significant surgery and recovery time, other things had to be ruled out. And when he addressed the other issues, either through surgery or rehabilitation, he had some success.
“In the beginning, we knew about the issue when it had happened,” Bakhtiari said. “And the whole goal was, let's even see if you're a symptomatic individual. You can easily not. There's a lot of the football players who have this and they're totally fine.
“Great, OK, so then, as I'm going through and rehabbing and progressing, then something else pops up. OK, and now I’ve got address this. And then another thing popped in, and we have to address that. And then, you know, then I'm fighting through trying to make sure I can play as much as I can last year.”
Bakhtiari said he was hopeful this past offseason that his knee issues were behind him because for the first time in two years he didn’t need offseason arthroscopic surgery to correct a problem. He said it allowed him to work out full-time throughout the offseason and address fully the atrophy that had occurred in his leg while recovering from three surgeries.
He said he did everything possible, including ingesting various natural healing substances emanating from inside and outside the U.S. borders, continually taking drug tests to make sure he hadn’t been given something the NFL had banned.
“I was willing to risk that because I wanted to play,” he said. “The whole goal is to play.
“And then you know, for me, it's like, I at least I can sleep at night knowing, did I do everything I could to not have to do this? Yes. Did I try as hard as I could to work with it (the knee). Yes.”
Bakhtiari said it became clear to the doctors that the condyles were the problem because they had cleaned out all the other things they thought might be causing his symptoms.
He said it was necessary to address the other problems because there was no proof the condyles were causing the fluid buildup and pain.
In addition, if Bakhtiari had the surgery to repair the condyles, he would have lost another season because the recovery time is so long. He had already sat out all but one game of the 2021 season and so having the surgery during the ’22 offseason or this past offseason would have guaranteed another lost year.
Bakhtiari had figured out a way in ’22 to manage the knee and finished the season playing in seven of the last 10 games and 11 total. But he said he was constantly recovering from having four ounces of fluid removed from his knee, which had become the norm, and that took a toll on him.
“I mean, football, we’re all going to leave with bumps and bruises,” Bakhtiari said. “Just give me something that I can work with. But it got to a point where it got too far. And now we need to reel it back because you can’t function with that.”
Bakhtiari’s eyes welled up when he talked about how supportive his wife has been throughout the ordeal and what it meant to him. He said he’d like to think he was strong enough not to bring his own stress and frustration home with him, but it isn't realistic and his wife was a big reason he has been able to handle all the anguish over not playing football.
When it came to his future, he was more pragmatic.
“I think everything’s on the table,” he said. “I can only control what I can control. They have decisions they need to make for what’s best for the franchise. I understood that the moment I got in here. And I’ve seen every face go. This face is going to go, too.”
If the surgery goes as planned, Bakhtiari might stay, too. But regardless of what happens with the Packers, he expects to be playing football next year.