Tearing an ACL is often a long road back. That road began for Eddie Vanderdoes just after the season finale last year. He tore his ACL against the Chargers on December 31 and started the new year headed for knee surgery.

Suffering the injury that late immediately endangered his 2018 season. Even with the long offseason, he has yet to take the field.

He spent the entirety of camp on the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list. Throughout those three weeks, he worked on the side with trainers, and from the looks of it, even as the end of camp approached, he still was not able to fully push off of the surgically repaired knee.

Now with under three weeks until the regular season, the outlook isn’t good that he will be nearly ready, leading to the likelihood that he will start the season on PUP.

“It’s getting to look that way,” Gruden said of Vanderdoes starting the season on PUP. “I mean I don’t want to say right now, but he has had no offseason work and hasn’t had one day of practice yet. He’s getting better, but it’s been a slow process.”

Should Vanderdoes be placed on PUP to start the season, he will miss at least the five six weeks. Once the six weeks is up, the Raiders will have five weeks to decide whether to let him begin practicing. Once he begins practicing, they will have an additional three weeks to decide whether to activate him.

The rookie third round pick started 13 games last season for the Raiders, recording 18 combined tackles (13 solo) with no sacks or any other stats.