Jim Harbaugh says Blake Corum is not participating in spring drills, will be full-go in June

On Thursday afternoon, Michigan head football coach Jim Harbaugh provided an update on star running back Blake Corum’s recovery from a meniscus tear he suffered at the tail end of the 2022 season. Here was that update, per On3’s Anthony Broome:

“Blake Corum is not participating in drills this spring, but is still working out and keeping up with strength and conditioning. Harbaugh says they expect him to be full go sometime around June.”

Corum put together a tremendous 2022 campaign, amassing over 1,400 yards in the 12 games he appeared in before having his year cut short ahead of Michigan’s return trip to the College Football Playoff. To the surprise of some, Corum opted not to go to the NFL Draft and instead will return to the Wolverines next season. With his health so up in the air, many folks believed he would go ahead and put his name in to avoid dropping significantly if he’s not 100% next year.

Alas, Corum will be back on the field and is expected to be fully healthy by the fall, where he’ll have an opportunity to prove to the professional ranks that he’s as good as new.

NFL doctor gives take on Corum injury/recovery

Broome caught up with a sports medicine doctor, Dr. Jessica Flynn, for The Wolverine to discuss what Corum’s recovery progress and timeline may look like. Here was everything she had to say:

“When you have a meniscus tear, there are two options,” she said. “One is to shave part of the meniscus out. That’s the most common thing done in older athletes. That’s called a meniscectomy. The other option is to try to repair the meniscus and stitch it back together. That’s challenging because the blood flow to the meniscus is not good. So it generally has to be a very young patient. Only certain styles of tears are candidates for it. It’s best to repair the tissue if you can.

“It was good news that they were able to repair it. I’m glad that he opted for repair rather than a quick recovery. With the trimming procedure, the recovery is about 5-6 months after an injury like this. Early on athletes are not really allowed to bear weight very much. They really protect the knee. They start to work on the range of motion on a bike with very low resistance, just to make sure that that need doesn’t get too stiff. And then they progress what he’s able to do, obviously very slowly over the next few months.

“I’m not sure if something got lost in translation with whether or not it was fully torn,” Flynn said. “Sometimes we see bruising in the meniscus or some wear and tear, but no tears that are coming to the surface. But we don’t really talk about partial tears of the meniscus. It’s either torn or it’s not. When there’s a significant tear, that’s repaired. That will determine the timeline, not if it was a partial tear to begin with. None of that really matters.”