Saints seek second opinion on QB Drew Brees' hand injury

LOS ANGELES — Two weeks into the 2019 season, the New Orleans Saints suddenly find themselves in a tricky spot to navigate after quarterback Drew Brees injured his right thumb in Sunday’s 27-9 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. 

After the game Sunday, Brees visited Dr. Steve Shin, a renowned hand specialist based in Los Angeles. By Monday morning, multiple reports emerged indicating Brees tore a ligament in his right thumb, an injury that would require surgery and approximately six weeks to properly heal. By Monday afternoon, coach Sean Payton tried to downplay the reports by saying nothing was settled yet. 

“They're still in the midst of evaluating it,” Payton said. “He’s had one opinion. He’s having a second opinion and as soon as we know something that we can confirm, we'll report it. But right now, it's kind of the stage we're in.”

When discussing Brees’ injury Monday, Payton often repeated that he was not going to discuss hypothetical scenarios until the team sees the results from the second opinion. 

But, if the first opinion proves to be true and Brees needs six weeks to return to the field, that would put him in line to return for the Saints’ Week 10 contest at home against the Atlanta Falcons. In that scenario, the Saints would presumably turn to Teddy Bridgewater, a former first-round pick of the Minnesota Vikings who returned to New Orleans on a one-year free agent deal this offseason. 

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In between, the Saints play on the road against Seattle, Jacksonville and Chicago and at home against Dallas, Tampa Bay and Arizona. In a somewhat fortunate scheduling quirk, Brees would still be able to play in five of the Saints’ six NFC South games even if he does not return to the field until Week 10. 

Few NFL quarterbacks have been as reliable as Brees in terms of ability to stay on the field. Since he signed with New Orleans in 2006, Brees has missed only three games, and only one of those games was due to injury. He sat out Week 17 contests in 2009 and 2018. 

So, this could be a bit of uncharted territory for the Saints in the Payton era. The coach was asked Monday if the roster the organization assembled without Brees was the type that could thrive without Brees at quarterback, and he started his answer by saying, “we're getting ready to find out.” 

“I think that hopefully the news is good and the length of time, if there is any, that he's out will be shorter (rather) than longer,” Payton said. “But again, that's part of our sport.”

At age 40 and entering his 19th NFL season, Brees was off to a strong start. After leading the NFL in passer rating and completion percentage last season, Brees threw for 370 yards in the season opener and was

Brees is the NFL’s all-time career leader in passing yards (74,845) and completion percentage (67.3 percent). He entered the year needing 20 touchdown passes to break Peyton Manning’s all-time record, though New England quarterback Tom Brady has now pulled even with Brees.