Troy Aikman strained his right calf early in a 1995 game against Washington. He couldn’t continue but played the next week and threw for 316 yards and a touchdown in a victory over the Packers.
So he has experience dealing with what current Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott now is dealing with. Prescott strained his right calf on the final play Sunday -- a 35-yard touchdown pass to CeeDee Lamb in overtime.
“I tore part of the muscle against Washington, and I could not have come back in the game and played and didn’t,” Aikman said on 1310 The Ticket, via Jon Machota of TheAthletic.com. “And I think based on what I saw of Dak walking off the field, I don’t think he could have come back and played if it had gone further. But can he play? Yeah. . . . The timing obviously is good for him. “What I found is I played the next week, and I was doubtful as to whether I would be able to do it. But I think the great thing about playing quarterback relative to other positions is, unless you just can’t throw the ball, something is wrong with your shoulder and elbow or something to that nature, then you can manage the injuries a little bit better.
Fortunately for Prescott, he has a week off before the Cowboys play the Vikings on Sunday Night Football.
“My guess is the calf is not going to be 100 percent in two weeks, but if he goes into the game, and he just knows that he can’t run, then he won’t run,” Aikman said. “He’ll just get rid of the football. So you’re able to manage it a lot better than if you were a wide receiver or a position where you have to be able to do certain things. And so I feel that he’ll play and to what extent he’s injured we probably won’t ever really know the answer to that because nobody will say. But I don’t see it impacting him other than potentially his ability to scramble. But they’ve got so many weapons and such a great offensive line and everything else, he doesn’t have to scramble. So they’ll get around that just fine.”
