New England Patriots receiver Mohamed Sanu will need surgery to repair an ankle sprain that hasn’t yet healed this off-season, according to ESPN Adam Schefter. This injury was the one that plagued the veteran catcher throughout the season and is probably one of the main reasons why his production fell at the end of the year with New England. The actual timetable for Sanu’s recovery was not released immediately.
Sanu initially suffered the injury, according to ESPN’s Mike Reiss, during a punt return against the Philadelphia Eagles in week 11, his third game with the Patriots since his return in a trade with the Atlanta Falcons. Before this game, Sanu had just achieved an impressive singular performance in the defeat of New England in week 9 against the Ravens in Baltimore. In this match, Tom Brady targeted Sanu 14 times and logged on ten of his shots for 81 yards and a touchdown.
Following the week 11 injury, Sanu had just 12 receptions for 99 yards the rest of the regular season. When the Patriots lost to the Wild Card Weekend against the Tennessee Titans, Sanu only managed to catch one of his five goals over 11 yards. Given this drastic drop in what Sanu was able to do in this week 9 contest against Baltimore and what he did the rest of the way after his injury to Philly, there seems to be no doubt that it hindered the rest of the way considerably and probably played through significant pain.
New England made a second-round pick for Sanu on the trade deadline this fall and is contracted throughout the 2020 season with a cap of $ 6.5 million. The Patriots could withdraw all of their Sanu money from their caps if they wanted to, but given the price it took to get it to Foxborough, it doesn’t seem likely they would have cut the bait if quickly. What this can do, however, is to force the Patriots’ hand to be even more aggressive to bring in robust pass sensors than originally thought.