Greg Olsen suffered foot injury in returning game since surgery

Injuries continue to plague Carolina Panthers tight end Greg Olsen, who finished the day on the sidelines after suffering another injury to his foot during Sunday's game against the New York Jets, the Panthers announced.

Olsen missed the last eight games after fracturing his right foot in Week 2 against the Buffalo Bills. The injury ended his streak of nine straight seasons playing all 16 games, and this is the first season of his career he's missed more than two games.
Olsen had been eager to return, and seemed to be right on schedule to do so. Bad breaks happen, and unfortunately, it seems Olsen may have been the victim of one. Hopefully for Carolina, this injury isn’t as severe as the previous one.

"He came back out at halftime," Carolina head coach Ron Rivera said. "He wanted to give it a try and it was sore. So the trainers just felt the best thing was to sit him down. We’ll see how he is once we get him back [Monday] morning."

Olsen said the move was more precautionary than anything else.

"I just had a little bit of a flare-up there," Olsen said. "I thought I could’ve kept going but the way the game was going there in the second half we just thought it would be best to err on the side of the caution."

Olsen, who caught for at least 1,000 yards in each of the past three seasons, hauled in a 10-yard pass from Cam Newton on the Panthers' second play of the game.

That was his only reception of the day. He was targeted four times.

The former Wayne Hills star now has 7,403 career receiving yards. He's nine away from tying former Eagles tight end Pete Retzlaff for seventh place on the NFL's all-time list for most receiving yards among tight ends.

Now the Panthers have to hope they can get Olsen back on the field and keep him there.

Olsen was optimistic on Sunday.

He said he felt good coming into the game, as well the weeks leading up to it.

His return might have been shorter than he or Carolina anticipated but it's not something Olsen is too concerned about.

"I’ve had a great four or five weeks of prep, so we’re not going to just throw that out the window for no reason,"' Olsen said. "We’ll regroup this week and see where we’re at."