In a video for Bleacher Report’s Uninterrupted series, Giants wide receiver Victor Cruz announced today that he’ll be sidelined for the rest of the 2015 season. According to Cruz, he’s undergoing a season-ending surgical procedure on his injured left calf.
Cruz, who turned 29 last Wednesday, had been working his way back from a torn patellar tendon that forced him to miss most of the 2014 season. However, during his recovery, he injured his calf, which has plagued him all season.
The Giants had hoped to see the veteran wideout back on the field earlier this year, and Cruz indicated in early October that he was “thoroughly convinced” he’d return and would be “playing at a high level” at some point in 2015. Repeated setbacks have made that impossible, however, and Cruz will undergo this procedure on his calf with the intention of getting back to 100% for the start of the 2016 campaign.
Whether Cruz’s return in 2016 happens in New York, with the Giants, remains to be seen. While the team would certainly like to hang onto him, the receiver’s cap number is set to jump to $9.9MM next year, including a $7.9MM base salary, and the Giants could create more than $6MM in cap savings by cutting him. I’d expect New York to explore the possibility of a pay cut and/or restructuring, since it’s unlikely the club would want to commit that sort of money to a player who has missed the last season and a half with major injuries.
The Giants haven’t made it official yet, but they’ll certainly place Cruz on the injured reserve list at some point this week, opening up a spot on the 53-man roster.