Full of battle scars, Cam McCormick proudly heads into ninth college football season

There are few injuries in sports as grueling and frightening as a torn Achilles tendon. It's the strongest tendon in the body and vital in the ability to walk, run and jump. Tearing it is not only a devastating, season-ending injury, it typically takes a full calendar year to recover. Some athletes are never the same as they were before.

So when then-Oregon tight end Cam McCormick tore his right Achilles tendon in 2021 during a game at Ohio State, one can imagine the disappointment and uncertainty he faced. But while those emotions appeared immediately following injury, he wasn't so worried when he found out it was his Achilles.

“When I figured out what it was, it was the best-case scenario for that injury,” McCormick told USA TODAY Sports. “That injury was one of the easiest ones I've had to kind of go through because it was so simple.”

It sounds insane to think an athlete didn’t stress about a torn Achilles tendon and that his mother, Debra McCormick, said “it was a piece of cake" to handle recovery.

However, McCormick isn’t your ordinary football player. Now a member of the Miami Hurricanes, McCormick is entering his ninth season of college football in 2024, which is believed to be a first in NCAA history.

That number is attention-grabbing. Nine seasons. It can make people crack jokes or tell him to give it up, stop dragging out his eligibility. But that's not McCormick's story. His is filled with years of agony, uncertainty, suffering and perseverance.

“It is wild to think about everything that I've had to overcome,” said McCormick, who scored his fifth-career touchdown on Saturday in a win over Florida.

The start of a long road

A three-star tight end in the 2016 recruiting class from Bend, Oregon, McCormick had his dream come true when he committed to play for the Oregon Ducks. According to his mother, he'd hoped to play for the program since he was a child.

Then, McCormick tore his ACL his senior year of high school — his first of many roadblocks. He was still recovering when he enrolled at Oregon and there were experienced tight ends already on the roster for coach Mark Helfrich's final year in Eugene, so McCormick opted to sit out and redshirt the 2016 season.

After fully healing with a year of watching and learning under his belt, McCormick felt ready for the 2017 season under first-year head coach Willie Taggart. But in January of that year, McCormick was one of three players hospitalized after a series of intense workouts. He was diagnosed with rhabdomyolysis, a rare injury where a person’s muscles break down, typically a result of excessive physical activity with limited rest. The injury could have several complications, such as kidney or liver failure, according to the Cleveland Clinic. The team's strength and conditioning coach, Irele Oderinde, was suspended and one of the players filed a lawsuit.

McCormick remembered he lost a good amount of his strength from rhabdomyolysis, but it didn’t stop him from playing all 13 games in 2017. He made two starts that season and recorded six catches for 89 yards and one touchdown.

Now that he had a taste of college football, he was ready to make another leap in 2018. That was until in the season opener against Bowling Green. In the second quarter of that game, a defender fell on the back of McCormick's legs. When he tried to stand up, he knew something felt off. He was carted to the locker room, and later found out his left fibula was broken and he had a torn ligament in his left ankle.

Just like that, another season derailed by injury.

McCormick still kept his hopes up. He thought it just meant another year of rehab and he’d be ready to go. Little did he know, it was the start of a more than two-year battle to play another meaningful snap.

'In pain 24 hours a day, seven days a week'

The pain started right before fall camp of the 2019 season. It was the same ankle that underwent surgery in 2018 and McCormick couldn't do many football activities. After weeks trying to figure out what was going on, doctors discovered another fracture caused by a screw placed in his ankle to allow healing with a suture through the bone.

Another surgery and another lost season.

As tough as it was to deal with, McCormick remained positive and leaned on his support system, spearheaded by his mother. It helped that Debra McCormick was in the same state so she could see him often and help him through recovery.

McCormick felt great during the offseason and was back training in Eugene for the shortened 2020 season when, again, the same foot began causing him pain. He was told the pain was likely tendonitis, a complication from surgery, but he felt it was something bigger.

“Every single day I would wake up, I'd have pain in my foot,” McCormick said. “There was never a time where I was just comfortable and not in pain. It was like, every single day, every moment, wherever I was. It was awful.”

That’s when things got really grim, Debra said, recalling a phone call from her son one day after practice.

“He was just bawling. He was crying, and he just felt like he couldn't go on anymore with football,” she said. “He was really contemplating quitting because he just didn't want to be in pain anymore. He was in pain 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”

The pain was too much and McCormick decided not to play the 2020 season. Debra felt helpless, running out of things to say to motivate her son and keep him positive.

There had been times before when she tried to tell her son maybe it was time to pay attention to the signs and stop playing, which had just lead to an argument. But this time was different. She was determined to not let her son give up his dream.

“I just didn't accept that as a mom. I was like, ‘No, no, no. There has to be something we can do,’” she said.

McCormick later learned what was nagging him: two screws put in to fix the previous fracture were rubbing on his posterior tibial tendon, and it resulted in a complete tear of the tendon.

He was trying to find ways to fix what was wrong when he stumbled upon a social media video of former NFL receiver Plaxico Burress praising Dr. Robert Anderson, currently the team physician for the Green Bay Packers, for helping him with his ankle during his career. McCormick found his information and told his mom he wanted to see him.

Thanks to one of Oregon’s team doctors being a mentee under Anderson, McCormick landed a consultation. He flew wit his mom to Wisconsin before Christmas and got an early gift: Anderson not only knew how to fix the injury, but he could get McCormick back on the field in time for the 2021 season.

Suddenly, he had a real shot of playing again and the spark inside of him was reignited.

“Cameron and I started crying,” Debra McCormick said. “We got tears of joy in our eyes.”

The surgery was a success and the duo flew back home on Christmas. He was indeed ready for the 2021 season and after years of pain and doubt, he played in the season opener against Fresno State, his first game in 1,099 days.

The next week was the game at Ohio State and he made a critical first down catch before tearing his Achilles. But at this point, a season-ending injury was nothing new for McCormick. He healed the tendon and was on track to play in the 2022 campaign, but that July, he endured a different kind of suffering.

His teammate Spencer Webb died at the age of 22 in a diving accident. They were friends, having been in the tight end room together, and McCormick said he holds him close to his heart. It was the first time McCormick lost someone so close to him and it was extremely painful, his mother said.

Inspired to honor his friend, McCormick played all 13 games for the Ducks in 2022, his first full season of action since 2017. It was a good one, too. He had a career-high 10 receptions and three touchdowns.

After playing a full season, McCormick said he felt he had done all he wanted at Oregon and needed a fresh start. There was nothing wrong with the program, but after everything he went through there, he wanted to continue his career elsewhere.

McCormick entered the transfer portal and one of the people to reach out was Miami head coach Mario Cristobal, who was his coach at Oregon from 2018-21. Even though times were rough at Oregon, McCormick said Cristobal helped him keep that drive to play alive. He stayed loyal to him, so McCormick wanted to return the favor and committed to play for the Hurricanes.

“He believed in me when I didn't believe in myself, when I felt like I couldn't do it anymore,” McCormick said. “It's easy to say, 'Hey, we don't want you on the team anymore. Maybe you need to medically retire.’ But he kept saying, ‘You're going to be back better than ever. You got this.’”

There were no issues for McCormick in his first season with Miami, appearing in all 13 games last season with starts in 11 of them.

'Everyone's journey is different'

McCormick has so many years of eligibility through medical redshirts, plus an extra year all college athletes got following the COVID-19 pandemic.

When he announced his decision to play this upcoming season, he was the subject of several jokes online, with social media users telling him it's preposterous to play a ninth season and to "go out and get a job."

He hears it, and so does his mother.

“Most people, they say negative things about him, and he's like the butt of every joke. As a parent, that's really hard to read a lot of that,” Debra said. “People slide into our DMs and they say the most horrible things at times.”

While yes, on the surface it may sound ridiculous for someone to play nine seasons of college football, the deeper you dive the more it makes complete sense. And McCormick hasn’t played even half of his entire college career because of his injuries. McCormick pointed out the 2024 season will only be the fourth season playing. His mom joked, “we have our entire lives to work a real job, right?” Besides, McCormick said he has greatly benefited from Name, Image and Likeness deals.

“People want to knock someone's journey or not even understand the full journey,” McCormick said. “They're gonna do what they do. They got to live with that, not me. I'm the one living stress-free over here, enjoying my life as it is. And if you feel like you got to bring that negativity into somebody's world, that's a shame on you.”

McCormick is focused on playing the 2024 season – and continuing to honor the legacy of Webb – before considering his future, with the main goal of playing every game this year. The Hurricanes not only have ACC title aspirations, but have a realistic shot of qualifying in the expanded College Football Playoff. After that, Debra hopes that her son's resilience will prove to NFL scouts he is not a quitter and can play at the next level.

“Cameron has overcome so many obstacles, not only on the football field, but just in life in general. He hasn't been dealt an easy deck of cards, but he's made the best of the deck that he was given,” Debra said. “I'm in awe of my son. I admire him.

“Yeah, he's been knocked down. But you know what? He got up every single time."

For all the hate messages directed at him, she said he’s also been an inspiration, receiving messages from people that have gone through their own challenges, and he offers them encouragement.

So yes, Cam McCormick will play a ninth season of college football. And despite all the setbacks, he’s grateful for what it took to get here.

“My journey might be a lot different than some others, but I'm still here. I'm still doing it, and I can't complain,” McCormick said. “I'm very blessed and fortunate, and I'm glad that what I've went through is what I've went through, because I'm standing 10 toes down, still smiling and grateful.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Cam McCormick of Miami ready for ninth college football season