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Florida Gators redshirt freshman quarterback Anthony Richardson injured his knee prior to the Gators’ Saturday loss to South Carolina while dancing at Florida’s team hotel on Friday, head coach Dan Mullen confirmed at the end of his Monday press conference.
Dan Mullen confirms the tale that was going around this weekend: QB Anthony Richardson hurt his knee dancing in the hotel on Friday night.
— Andy Staples (@Andy_Staples) November 8, 2021
He said he could have played Saturday, but hadn't practiced until Thursday because that's when he was cleared.
Mullen also said that Richardson had an MRI scan done and that it came back clear, a good sign that whatever knee injury he sustained was minor. Richardson did not play against the Gamecocks, with Emory Jones taking all of Florida’s snaps at quarterback.
Richardson getting hurt while dancing is objectively hilarious even without the context of his season — and with the context, which also includes an aggravation of a hamstring injury sustained while rushing for a touchdown against USF and injuries from in-game contact that forced him to leave games against LSU and Georgia, the latter of which was the concussion that kept Richardson from being cleared for practice until Thursday of last week, it’s funnier still, if also perhaps a minimally concerning note on his durability.
Then again, Richardson is also the sort of transcendent athlete who has incorporated acrobatic flips into his pregame warmup to much fanfare, and he was recorded performing a standing backflip on the concrete sidewalk outside of The Swamp while barefoot without incident after Florida’s season opener.
My son Sage and @AR15Apparel @GVOaant doing a backflip pic.twitter.com/jMda3EzCxW
— Aaron Crews (@AaronCrews86) September 26, 2021
Maybe mortals are simply not meant to understand demigods.