Browns lose Anthony Walker Jr. to injury

The Cleveland Browns will be without starting linebacker Anthony Walker Jr. for the rest of the season after Walker suffered a torn quad tendon in his left leg on Thursday night.

The Browns confirmed what everyone who saw the injury feared on Friday after head coach Kevin Stefanski had already met with the media.

Walker was injured in the third quarter of Cleveland’s 29-17 victory against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Walker took a block from Pittsburgh offensive tackle Chukwuma Okorafor and went down awkwardly. Perhaps fearing that Walker was trying to dupe the Steelers and would soon be back on the play, Okorafor performed some form of body drop as Walker lay facedown on the field.

Walker was eventually taken off the field on a cart with an air cast on his leg and will now undergo season-ending surgery to repair the damaged tendon.

It is a big hit to the Browns defense as Walker was a sound veteran presence among a young group of linebackers and called the plays in the defensive huddle, or to use the terminology that the cool kids employ, he wore the green dot for the defense.

With Walker now out for the year, the Browns will turn to third-year linebacker Jacob Phillips to fill Walker’s place in the lineup and role as the defensive play caller. Phillips had a nice night against the Steelers, finishing with a team-high seven tackles and a sack.

Walker is not the only Cleveland linebacker dealing with an injury as fellow starter Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah also left the game in the third quarter after suffering a groin injury.

While Stefanski did not offer an update about Owusu-Koramoah, the second-year linebacker is planning to have an MRI done on his injury, according to cleveland.com.

Adjusting to not having Walker in the lineup will be difficult enough, so hopefully, Owusu-Koramoah will be fine by the time the Browns return to action on October 2 against the Atlanta Falcons.