Trevor Lawrence’s 2024 season is over, Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson confirmed on Friday.
The Jaguars placed Lawrence, their starting quarterback, on injured reserve Wednesday, sidelining him for at least four games as he recovers from a concussion suffered against the Houston Texans on Sunday and a left shoulder injury from Week 9 against the Philadelphia Eagles.
The latter injury knocked Lawrence out of two games, Weeks 10-11, against the Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Lions.
With Jacksonville now 2-10 and eliminated from postseason contention, Pederson explained that the timing of Lawrence’s combination of injuries made shutting down his season sensible.
“Obviously, the reason for IR is not the injury from Sunday. It’s not that. It’s more the shoulder,” Pederson said. “But, you know, it’s obviously, listen, where we are in our season, you know? The chance for him to get healthy right now as he looks into the offseason and next season as well, getting healthy.
“Obviously the injury Sunday doesn’t help, right? But it’s just, I think the right decision right now to go ahead and just shut him down and let him get fully healed. Clear the protocol first, obviously, and then tackle the other injury later on. So that’s our main focus right now, to make sure he’s 100% and get him healthy and get himself ready for the offseason.”
Lawrence plans to have surgery on his shoulder injury, a sprained AC joint, in the coming weeks after clearing the NFL’s concussion protocol.
Pederson acknowledged that Lawrence did not aggravate his shoulder sprain against the Texans but suggested the quarterback was likely to undergo surgery to treat the injury at some point. His concussion accelerated that timeline.
“It didn’t get any worse. He didn’t take any shots or hits on it,” Pederson noted.
“It’s just a matter of, it was gonna probably eventually come to that, you know, surgery. But now with everything and where our season is too, this is the — there’s never a good time, but if there is a time, this would be it.”
Lawrence, who signed a five-year, $275 million contract extension with Jacksonville in June, completed 172-of-284 passes for 2,045 yards with 11 touchdowns and seven interceptions in 10 starts this season. He added 119 yards and three touchdowns rushing.
