Cleveland Browns name Jack Conklin as Ed Block Courage Award winner
Whenever Jack Conklin’s name came up before the season, whoever was talking about the Browns right tackle made a point to mention how much time he was spending at the team’s facility. All of that that time was just so he could get back on the field after a season-ending patellar tendon tear in late November 2021.
“It’s definitely monotonous,” Conklin recalled during a Zoom call Tuesday. “Especially with a knee injury like that. You do a lot of the same stuff every day and it feels like you’re really not progressing just because it’s, again, like I said, it’s the same stuff over and over again. And you kinda have to get in that mindset of where you can’t think day to day, you gotta think, well a month or two from now, I’m going to have progressed a lot.
“And I think that’s where having gone through a knee surgery before, I was able to look back on that and say, hey, well it sucks a lot right now. Things are getting boring. You’re doing the same things over again, but you gotta remember in the long run and two months from now you’re going to be like, I can’t believe where I was at then to now.”
That monotonous work that Conklin’s put in has paid off in multiple ways. After missing the first two games of the regular season, he was able to get back on the field and stay on it for the Browns’ last 11 games.
On Tuesday, Conklin also added a new piece of hardware to his awards mantle. The Browns announced he was the team’s recipient of the Ed Block Courage Award.
The award, handed out since 1984, is based on a vote of the players and is given annually to one individual based on courage, compassion, commitment and community. Each team across the league will have one honoree for the award, which is in honor or former Baltimore Colts head athletic trainer Ed Block.
“You said it right there — anytime the team votes on something and they honored me with that, it’s huge to me,” Conklin said. “It means a lot to me to have my teammates see the work I put in and see how hard it was and to believe in me and vote me in. It means a lot.”
That the award was announced the same week the Browns prepare to play host to the Baltimore Raves at 4:30 p.m. Saturday is certainly an interesting twist. It was during a game against the Ravens in Baltimore on Nov. 28, 2021, that he sustained the injury that ended his season.
The comeback journey was a lengthy one for the two-time All-Pro right tackle, who spent eight weeks unable to bend his leg after undergoing surgery.
During that same time, Conklin’s wife Caitlyn was also dealing with two children under the age of 5. He admits she had a third child to deal with during that time as well in him.