Anton Harrison Had Knee Surgery and the 4-1 Jaguars Have a Range of Outcomes They Do Not Like
The Jacksonville Jaguars are 4-1, first in the AFC South, and riding a three-game winning streak after beating Philadelphia 19-17 in London on Cam Little’s 57-yard field goal as time expired.
They are also about to find out how good their offensive line depth is. Left tackle Anton Harrison underwent arthroscopic knee surgery.
The Timeline Has an Enormous Range
Per reporting from Ian Rapoport and Jeremy Fowler, the expectation is three to five weeks. The caveat is the part that matters: if the surgeon finds more damage than the imaging suggested, it becomes three to four months.
Those are not adjacent outcomes. Three weeks means Harrison misses a stretch of a season Jacksonville is winning. Four months ends his year.
Arthroscopic procedures are often exploratory in exactly this way. The team will know considerably more after the fact than it did going in, which is why no firm return date has been attached.
Why a Left Tackle Matters Here Specifically
Jacksonville’s offense under Liam Coen has not been built on explosive passing. Brian Thomas Jr., the 2024 first-round pick who was supposed to be the centerpiece, has nine catches for 105 yards and a touchdown through five games, with three or fewer targets in four of them. He caught none of his three targets against Philadelphia.
Parker Washington has been Trevor Lawrence’s primary target instead. That is an offense winning on efficiency, field position and defense rather than big plays.
An offense like that cannot absorb pressure off the edge. The margin is already thin, and the Jaguars have won their last three games by a combined total that does not suggest comfort.
The 4-1 Record Is Real
Jacksonville has a plus-53 point differential, which is the strongest argument that this team is better than a schedule-driven hot start. Beating the Eagles in London, even an Eagles team that is 2-3 and struggling, is a quality win.
The AFC South is there to be taken. Houston just traded for Marvin Harrison Jr. and has been sorting itself out. Nobody in the division has separated.
What the Jaguars Should Do
The NFL trade deadline is November 10. A 4-1 team with a left tackle facing a three-week-to-four-month range should be making calls, not waiting for a diagnosis.
Offensive tackle is the hardest position to acquire in season and the most expensive to go without. Green Bay signed 36-year-old Kevin Zeitler earlier this season for exactly this reason, and that was for an interior spot.
There is a version of this where Harrison is back by early November and the Jaguars never miss him. There is another where Jacksonville finds out in Week 9 that it needed a tackle in Week 6.
No contract details or roster corresponding moves have been announced.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
