By Nick Wagoner
Staff Writer

It’s impossible to think that an NFL offensive lineman can ever make it through a season without garnering his share of injuries. However large or minor, with the amount of contact and physical pain those players in the trenches endure every Sunday or Monday, it’s hard to comprehend unless you go through it yourself.

Rams’ guard Adam Timmerman, though, has been rather fortunate throughout his career. Usually, when Timmerman is hampered by an injury, it has been a minor one that hasn’t cost him any serious amount of time. 

In fact, Timmerman’s health has been so good throughout his 10-year career; Timmerman has been able to put together a streak of 157 consecutive games played. In those 10 years, Timmerman has been through just two arthroscopic surgeries. All of that seemed like it might come crashing down this year, though, as Timmerman suffered a number of injuries. 

On Monday, Timmerman walked around Rams Park only with the aide of a pair of crutches, calling the 2004 season his most injury-plagued to date.

“It probably was,” Timmerman said. “Out of the ten, that was definitely the worst one. In the grand scheme of things, it was all still minor stuff, nothing really major. Hopefully I can stay away from that stuff.”

Although Timmerman is correct that most of the injuries were minor, there is still a good reason why he said “all” of them were minor. The laundry list of injuries and bang-ups is rather long. 

The three biggest injuries, though were the following:

• A stress fracture in his right foot.
• Weakness in the right shoulder
• Weakness in the left shoulder

In an effort to get better, Timmerman decided early in the off-season to start a run of surgeries that would make most of the doctors on “E.R.” jealous. In the span of about three weeks, Timmerman surpassed his career surgery total by having three separate operations.

About six and a half weeks ago, Timmerman had surgery on his foot. The doctors inserted a pair of screws into the foot. Two and a half weeks later, he had surgery on both of his shoulders. That surgery was mostly cleanup work according to Timmerman.

“They ground down into the clavicle and got rid of some calcium deposits that were just kind of building up over time,” Timmerman said.

Timmerman is unable to fully participate in the entire off-season training program that began Monday, but he is attempting to workout and is capable of doing activities that keep weight off his foot.

“I can do bike, I can do a lot of the lifting with the shoulder stuff, I actually can do leg extension and curls,” Timmerman said. “It will be a while before I can do either running or plyometrics.”

For now, Timmerman says he is happy to be walking at all, even with the help of crutches. He spent the first few weeks after surgery sitting in a chair before moving on to what he calls a “rollabout thing” that he used to move around. Timmerman will remain on crutches for a little while, but is hoping to be ready in time for training camp in July.

“I think so,” Timmerman said. “I will probably still watch it a little during training camp, but I should be back for the regular season and the last couple of preseason games for sure.”