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Myles Jack's knee injury pushes him out of the first round

Nothing good can happen when NFL teams start dissecting medical records before the draft. It'll either be neutral or bad.

For UCLA linebacker Myles Jack, it was really bad.

Months ago, the thought of Jack slipping out of the top 10 seemed crazy. He did. He seemed like a great fit for the Oakland Raiders at No. 14, but the Raiders took West Virginia safety Karl Joseph. And he kept slipping. Jack was among a few players left in the green room in Chicago late in the first round. The first round ended just before midnight Eastern time, and Jack never heard his name called. Rough night.

(AP)
(AP)

Jack was considered a possible top-five pick at times in the pre-draft process. Some wondered if he was actually the best player in the draft. Then the questions started about his knee. Some teams reportedly took him off their board. The possibility of microfracture surgery was mentioned, and that's scary for a team using a high draft pick.

Jack's fall out of the first round will cost him a fortune in salary. For reference, last year's 10th pick was running back Todd Gurley, and he got a $13.8 million deal with an $8.3 million signing bonus. The first pick of the second round last year, safety Landon Collins, got $6.1 million with a $2.7 million signing bonus. Jack was never guaranteed to be a top-10 pick, but there's no guarantee his slide ends right away Friday either. He has already lost millions of dollars and it could get worse. However, Jack will make a lot of the lost earnings up with an insurance policy that reportedly would pay him $5 million if he fell out of the first round due to injury.

Teams aren't going to base such important decisions on a media interview, but what Jack told the New York Post this week at an NFL draft event couldn't have put any NFL decision makers Jack at ease.

“[The degenerative problems are] there, but it’s nothing extreme,” Jack said. “Down the line, possibly I could have microfracture surgery — potentially. Who knows what will happen?

“Nobody knows how long anybody is going to play in this league. To play three years in this league would be above average.”

The "three years" part sums up the risk for teams. It's tough to take a player in the first round if you have no idea how long his knee will hold up. Jack said he would "understand" if he fell in the draft. The entire process had to be disheartening to him. His honesty in that interview might not have affected where he was drafted, but it certainly didn't help.

This wasn't a situation where a player fell because of some off-field mistakes. Jack didn't do anything wrong. He just suffered an injury, and then a ton of questions were raised when teams looked closely at his medical reports.

Jack will still be on the board at the start of the second round. Even though he said he would understand if he slipped in the draft, it still has to be a surprise he never heard his name called at all on Thursday.

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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!