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FAYETTEVILLE — A fear crept over Colton Jackson when he woke up one morning early last July.
The back pain he had been experiencing during offseason workouts wasn’t just “normal stuff” like he had hoped. It was something much worse.
“I’m laying in my bed and I was frozen. I couldn’t move, like I was paralyzed,” Jackson said. “It was honestly scary because anything with your spine, it could possibly end careers and affect you for life.”
Adding to his fear, Jackson came to Arkansas in the same signing class as Rawleigh Williams III. He was there when the talented running back suffered a neck injury against Auburn in 2015 and again during spring practice in April 2017, forcing him to retire.
With that thought in the back of his mind, the lineman from Conway, Ark., picked up his phone and called Dave Polanski, the Razorbacks’ head athletic trainer.
Although he was just days into the job, Polanski was aware of the back pain Jackson was dealing with. When he heard the symptoms now included numbness down his leg, he had a pretty good idea of what was going on.
“He had been having some back pain, he had been having those things, so you know if he had a disc herniation that puts pressure on the nerve, you’re going to get that,” Polanski said. “It’s concerning, but it wasn’t surprising.”
Less than three months after not being able to get out of bed, Jackson returned to the field and it didn’t take him long to regain his job as the starting left tackle. The journey has been far from smooth and easy, though.
Getting back on the field was just half the battle. Following arguably the worst season in school history, the Razorbacks signed two junior college transfers to replace him.
Yet three weeks out from the Aug. 31 season opener against Portland State, Jackson - now a fifth-year senior - is still with the first unit and tasked with protecting the quarterback’s blindside.
Road to Recovery
On July 5, an MRI revealed what Polanski expected: A herniated disc in his spine was causing Jackson’s pain.
Much to Jackson’s surprise, the doctors told him the injury was 10 years in the making. He hadn’t experienced any back problems during his first three years with the Razorbacks, but with the heavy weight lifting and normal wear and tear on his back that comes with playing on the offensive line in the SEC, it was only a matter of time.
“I guess it just built up to a point where I couldn’t stand it,” Jackson said. “It all just happened at once and that was the worst pain I’ve ever been through in my life.”
Initially, Polanski and his staff attempted to treat the injury conservatively, trying to decrease the swelling around the spinal cord through rehab and medicine.
After a week and a half of that and with the season on the horizon, though, a decision was looming. The conservative approach might have worked, but it could have taken the whole season or he might have played some and then suffered a season-ending injury. That left one option.
“Back surgeries are always kind of a last resort,” Polanski said. “Based on timing, it fit the timeline for us and for Colton, more importantly, he wanted to play.”
They decided July 16 to do the surgery and he had the procedure two days later. It was expected to keep him out at least the first half of the season and Jackson didn’t want to take a medical redshirt, so he attacked his rehab hard.
Every day for five weeks, he spent 2-3 hours with Polanski or a member of his staff. They worked on stability exercises before moving to flexibility and running - starting with the team’s underwater treadmill.
Each time Jackson met with the doctor, he was ahead of schedule and could move on to the next step. Along the way, he shaved several weeks off the projected timeline.
“It was a group effort of the doctors and us,” Polanski said, “but more importantly, Colton was the one that wanted to do it and showed with everything we gave him that he tolerated it well.”
Season Struggles
The North Texas game is one many fans would probably like to erase from their memories. It was a big milestone for Jackson, though, as he returned to the field just eight weeks after his surgery.
He played only 23 snaps off the bench in the 44-17 loss, but then started eight of the final nine games.
“I kind of rushed the recovery and came back Week 3 because I didn’t want to miss the season,” Jackson said. “I didn’t want to let anybody down.”
Despite being nowhere close to 100 percent, Jackson missed only seven snaps over the next four games. Back spasms prevented him from playing against Tulsa, but he returned and played every snap of the next three games before playing just half of the Missouri game.
There’s no doubt Jackson earned his teammates’ respect by fighting to get back on the field so quickly, but “at the same time,” fellow offensive lineman Shane Clenin said, “you’re kind of worried because you don’t want him to mess himself up even more.”
Coming back when he did also had a negative effect on his overall play.
Although no traditional statistics exist to measure the individual play of offensive linemen, Pro Football Focus - an analytics website - reviews film and gives a 0-100 grade to every player on the field.
Jackson earned an abysmal 49.5 overall grade for the season, which ranked 247th out of 254 FBS tackles who played at least 500 snaps. He hit rock bottom in the finale against Missouri, when his 32.1 grade included a 0.0 pass-blocking grade.
With low numbers on the offensive line, Jackson was essentially forced to play because he was the best the Razorbacks had - even when he was still dealing with excruciating pain.
“I’d take shots and pills and all that stuff before the game, at halftime, to just kind of numb the pain so I don’t feel it during the game,” Jackson said. “Then after the game, all that comes and rushes back.”
Jackson then spent all day Sunday and much of the next week rehabbing and recovering to prepare his body just to do it all again.
He also heard the criticism from media and fans throughout the season. Even though they weren’t aware of the severity of his injury or his expedited recovery timeline, he tried to ignore it. Jackson said he doesn’t blame them because he knew he wasn’t moving or playing the way he knew he could.
“I’m not using that as a crutch at all,” Jackson said. “Every athlete goes through that, everybody has some pains, but coming back that fast from a serious, possibly career-ending surgery like that, it’s not no joke.
“But I don’t blame anybody for it. It’s part of the game. … They saw my performance on the field and that’s what they made their assumptions on. That’s just part of the game.”
Arkansas’ coaches also took notice of Jackson’s poor play. In addition to bringing in seven high school offensive linemen - four on scholarship and three walk-ons - and Notre Dame transfer Luke Jones to replenish their depth, the Razorbacks also targeted some immediate help.
By signing junior college transfers Myron Cunningham and Chibueze Nwanna, the coaching staff sent Jackson a message and he heard it loud and clear: Elevate your game or lose your spot.
Becoming a Leader
In the transfer portal era of college football, it has become quite common for players to pack up and leave when faced with a similar situation as Jackson.
He didn’t take that route, though. Instead, he stayed in Fayetteville and took it upon himself to become more of a vocal leader in his position room - a void created by the graduation of Hjalte Froholdt, who is now with the New England Patriots.
A quiet guy by nature, it has been a challenge for Jackson. However, he realized that he’s the most experienced lineman on the team and could be a resource for the younger players, so he made it a point to be more outspoken this offseason and his teammates have accepted it.
“When he says something, it really matters and it’s something that really hits home,” Clenin said. “He’s still not a rah-rah guy, he’s not going to say stuff just to fire us up, but I like how everything he says actually has some meaning to it.”
Jackson stepped up to the challenge on the field, too. Both junior college transfers enrolled at the semester and went through spring practice, with Cunningham emerging as a serious contender to start on the line.
The only problem was that Jackson also had a great spring and earned high praise from the coaches. He managed to keep his starting job while simultaneously teaching his teammates, including the one trying to beat him out.
“Myron has only made him better and he’s only made Myron better,” offensive lineman Dalton Wagner said. “He’s coached up Myron so much. He knows Myron is the second guy trying to take his spot, but he doesn’t care.
“He’s going to coach him up. He’s going to try to make him better. That’s his mindset for everything.”
Unfortunately, a knee injury late in spring sidelined him for the final week of practice and prevented him from playing in the Red-White game. The minor surgery it required didn’t keep him down for long and he returned for most of the offseason workouts.
NCAA rules prevent coaches from working with players on the field during the summer, which means teams rely on player-led drills. Offensive line coach Dustin Fry was impressed with how Jackson led his unit in those activities, calling him a “second coach.”
“Some guys get disappointed when they get injured or when they don’t finish the year as well, (but) he’s been harder on himself than anything,” Fry said. “Some guys get injuries and they just get mad and go away, and he’s been a mainstay in that room.”
One week into fall camp, Jackson still has a firm hold on the left tackle spot. The Razorbacks are so comfortable with him, in fact, that they’re trying Cunningham out at other positions on the line.
Barring a re-injury - which Polanski said is unlikely as long as he maintains strength in his core and hips - or another setback, he’ll likely be the starter against Portland State.
That will mark the beginning of what Jackson hopes to be a season of redemption. If he takes the same approach as he did with his rehab, there’s a good chance he’ll have better results on the field in 2019.
“We give the guys a roadmap to do it and they have to follow it and he did,” Polanski said. “He worked his butt off to do it and he’s a tough kid and can put up with a little bit.
“He had increased pain, but he reported it right away, we took care of it and he was willing to keep going. That’s the big thing - he was able to push himself.”
