Less than four months after suffering a neck injury in a car crash, Tampa Bay Buccaneers defensive end Jason Pierre-Paul will now begin his 2019 season on the reserve/non-football injury list.
The team expected it would need to make the move to give Pierre-Paul enough time to be medically cleared by doctors and then begin to rehab before returning to the field.
He just recently attended Tampa Bay’s practice for the first time without a neck brace and received clearance to begin the rehab process by doctors. Pierre-Paul will automatically miss the first six weeks of the regular season and remains without a specific timetable for a return.
The 30-year-old pass rusher found plenty of success with the Buccaneers in 2018 with 12.5 sacks. It was Pierre-Paul’s first season with double-digit sacks since 2014 with the New York Giants.