Derrick Barnes walked into the training room Wednesday for his first rehab session with Detroit Lions trainers when he bumped into Aidan Hutchinson.
“I didn’t even get a hi when I walked in there,” Barnes said. “He just started giving me shit right off the bat and Brett Fisch(er, the Lions’ director of player health and performance), he was freaking giving me tissues saying that I’m going to make you cry during this P.T. But I almost did, though. Almost got a tear out me for sure.”
Barnes talked with reporters Wednesday for the first time since suffering a likely season-ending knee injury in the Lions’ Week 3 win over the Arizona Cardinals.
He told the Free Press he tore the MCL and PCL in his right knee but did not suffer any ACL damage, and did not know the full extent of his injury until he went to Houston for surgery last month.
“ACL was fine, so recovery obviously is shorter now than it would’ve been,” Barnes said. “Thank God I woke up and he said he didn’t have to do anything with the ACL.”
Barnes still faces a long road to recovery, one that likely will keep him out the rest of the season.
He spent the first five weeks after surgery on crutches and in a knee brace, and started physical therapy with his old college trainers at Purdue.
Barnes ditched his crutches last week, returned to Detroit on Tuesday night and plans to stay with the Lions for the rest of his rehab. He hasn’t started running yet, but said he hit a milestone in his rehab Wednesday.
“I didn’t know I was going to be able to ride the bike today,” Barnes said. “Got on the bike, a little bit of walking inside the water, which was good for me. And my leg’s been super stiff and today is the first day I felt kind of normal and it’s been pretty well.”
Barnes was off to the best start of his NFL career before the injury with nine tackles in the Lions’ first two games. He started at strong-side linebacker and gave the defense the versatile presence it lacked at the position since Dan Campbell and Aaron Glenn took over as head coach and defensive coordinator in 2021.
A fourth-round pick out of Purdue, Barnes is in the final year of his contract and seemed headed for a big payday in March before the injury.
He acknowledged Wednesday “that was a worry of mine,” but said, “I’m a God-fearing man and I believe in the Lord and the things he’s got for me.”
“The first couple of weeks, it’s hard,” Barnes told the Free Press. “I thought about it a lot, but I look towards my faith and I know everything will work out in my favor, but now it’s basically more of trying to get back to a 100% and trying to get back to my normal self. And then obviously it was an important season, but every season to me is important whether it was contract or first year, third year. But no, it’s mentally been good so I’m just, however that takes me, wherever it takes me, I’ll get to that battle when I get to it.”
The Lions have lost four of their top edge defenders this season in Barnes, Hutchinson (broken leg), Marcus Davenport (torn triceps) and John Cominsky (torn MCL). Davenport is out for the season, Cominsky could return for the playoffs, and Barnes said he’s taking a Hutchinson-like approach to his rehab and holding out hope he can return for the Super Bowl.
He said he thinks chop blocks like the one he got injured on should be outlawed, but said he can’t complain too much “because I do the hitting.”
And as happy as he is to see the Lions atop the NFC with an 8-1 record, he said his injury and his time away from teammates has given him a new appreciation for the game.
“Everything was just starting to come along, but I’m still, when I get my body right, I’ll have full confidence in myself and how my body will respond,” he said. “I know my mental still will be there. I still go through the playbook a little bit and make sure I still got it and it’s still there. So no, everything’s going to be good. And however long that take, it’s still going to work out.”
