Travis Hunter LCL Injury: Mike Florio Urges Jaguars to “Rethink Their Two-Way Strategy”

Heading into the first day of the 2025 NFL Draft, everyone knew that they were going to hear the name Travis Hunter being called early on into the night. The only doubt that anyone had in their mind was whether or not he could successfully play on both sides of the ball at the next level.

Giving one player such a sheer volume of reps had never truly been tried in the modern era of the NFL, and that resulted in several fans and analysts alike fearing that Hunter would sustain an injury sooner rather than later. Unfortunately, that’s now proven to be the case, as the Jacksonville Jaguars have now announced that their two-way sensation had undergone a season-ending surgery on his knee just two days after their 36-29 loss to the Houston Texans.

Now that everyone’s worst nightmare has officially come true, Mike Florio is urging the Jags to put away the “pride and ego” that they have invested in Hunter and reconsider this little experiment of theirs.

“What non-contact knee injury usually works out fine? …He’s going to miss part of the off-season program, the bulk of the off-season program. They need to rethink this whole two-way thing. They really do… [The injury] may be a fluke. It’s a shame. I feel bad for Travis Hunter, but the Jaguars need to take a step back and ask themselves, ‘Should we really just focus on one side of the ball?'”

Regardless of whether or not Hunter’s workload was the actual cause of his injury, the end result still proved to be what many expected, and that alone will be more than enough to cause the Jaguars to pause a bit before making their next decision.

After all, when you trade away two future first-round draft picks in order to draft someone who you believe to be a two-in-one player, you’re hoping for him to hang around for a while and become the next face of your franchise.

Neither the front office nor the coaching staff in Jacksonville has made any comments one way or the other about their plans for Hunter‘s snap counts and responsibilities, but that doesn’t change the fact that these will be talking points that loom over them for the next calendar year.

Simply put, Jacksonville is well within its rights to proceed with caution, but it also needs to avoid paralysis by analysis. Otherwise, they’ll risk setting their franchise back even further, as there’s no insurance policy or draft picks to bail them out of the commitment that they’ve made here.