Breer on the Challenges and Perils of a Potential Aaron Donald Comeback From an Ex-Pro Bowler Who Made One

• Breer’s Takeaways: How the A.J. Brown Trade Finally Got Done, and the Browns’ Future After Myles Garrett

Eric Weddle had just taken me through all the damage that his historic comeback at the end of the 2021 season had done, and how hard it was to pull off, and I had just one question left for him as he and I discussed the idea that Aaron Donald might, somehow, return in 2026.

Was it worth it?

“Oh, a thousand percent,” Weddle said, with a laugh. “I mean, if they called me and it is the same exact scenario and they needed me now, I would again, honestly. I don’t think I would pass a physical, how bad my ruptured pec was. If I was a younger guy, say like in the middle of my career, and that injury happened, I think I would’ve been forced to retire because no one would clear me, how bad my pec was. So I don’t even think I could.

“But I bet I would try.”

Retired for nearly 2 years. Coaching his son’s football team. Then the Rams called.

Eric Weddle came back for ONE playoff run, played through a torn pec in the Super Bowl and walked away a champion. 🏆

One of the craziest comeback stories in NFL history.#NFL #Rams pic.twitter.com/vStT7D1OIz

— Humans of NFL (@humansofnfl) June 6, 2026

Last week, when the Myles Garrett bombshell dropped and Donald texted Pat McAfee to say that, because of his bond with Garrett, he’d consider a comeback, it was Weddle who I first thought of.

It was too easy a parallel to draw. Same team. Same head coach and general manager. Same city. There are some differences, too. Weddle had played only a year previously with the Rams, capping a 13-year NFL career in his native Southern California before retiring after the 2019 season. He was coaxed out of retirement as the ’21 playoffs started two years later, with Sean McVay and Raheem Morris facing a catastrophic injury situation at safety.

Conversely, Donald spent a decade with the Rams and played seven seasons for McVay, and we’re talking about this now, at a point where Los Angeles doesn’t have a huge need at his position, and there’s a full training camp and regular season ahead, rather than a playoff run that wouldn’t last more than five weeks.

Still, plenty of challenges Donald would face are similar to those Weddle did.

“It’s just a lot,” Weddle said. “I just think from experience, you get comfortable in what you’re doing. He’s still obviously training like a madman—I wasn’t training like that or even working out to that extent, it was more so to just feel good. But he still is pushing around a lot of weight, and it really comes down to the commitment and the fire, if you have it or not. And only he knows that. But if he does, if this does light something in him? When does he come back? Does he want to do the whole season? Does he want to do half?

“Then it’s the dynamics of the team and the D-line. And obviously they’re going to welcome him in, but still that’s going to be tough on some guys, like they’re going to lose playing time there. Are they going to be OK with that? It’s going to be three years from when he last played. So there are just a lot of different dynamics.”

Over our half-hour conversation, Weddle helped us dissect those dynamics.

In doing so, he illustrated just how complex the idea of a Donald comeback actually is.

• Donald, like Weddle, had a passion for football that would never be questioned, and was legitimately visible in his playing style. Yet, for Weddle, returning at the end of the 2021 season wasn’t about that. He was fully at peace with his retirement. And then, Rams safeties Jordan Fuller and Taylor Rapp got hurt and McVay called, and he went for it. Likewise, Donald will have to make a call on whether or not, mentally, he’s good with diving back in.

“I was done,” he said. “I didn’t want to play again. Never wanted to play. Never had the itch. My mind and body were completely content on being retired and I was enjoying it. I was happy. But an opportunity comes up like this where it’s like once in a lifetime, so you have to engage and then see if this is worth it or not. Can you do it is a whole other obstacle. Like there isn’t any doubt in my mind that he could do it, he’s just that type of person and player. It’s just really the mental side of it. Are you going to be all-in on the grind?”

• Timing is another question. I happened to be on with Rich Eisen when McAfee and Donald’s exchange came to light, and Eisen asked me about Donald coming back, something I hadn’t heard a thing about yet. My response was actually that a Weddle-like comeback seemed more realistic to me than a full season comeback, which is a totally different deal.

“I basically knew this could be one week of going back and living a dream, or it could be max five weeks, six weeks, and I’m done,” Weddle said. “So I can compartmentalize and sacrifice and basically not be a dad and father and husband and coach and do everything I was doing, I could put that on hold for six weeks—like I can handle that and just pour into this. Or it could be done in a week. For me, there was absolutely zero chance for me to go back for a whole season. I wouldn’t have done it. …

“I don’t really talk to him on that stuff. But, man, thinking about that, being two years removed, there’s no way I’d do it. Now, if you say, ‘Hey, come for this playoff run.’ Yeah, why not? Maybe they’ll have some type of agreement. Like, I could see them doing that, ‘Hey, we’ll bring you up the last quarter of the season just to get your feet wet, get you acclimated and then playoff time, you’re going to be rolling.’ I could totally see that.”

• Then, there’s the physical piece of it, and the rust that would exist. For Weddle, it was, in his words, the running. His mind was sharp. He could manage the physical toll. But, “it was just the running and the change of direction. Of the three times I went 100%, I pulled or strained a muscle in my body every time.” That, of course, is because he played safety. Playing defensive tackle would present such challenges, but they’d be different ones.

“I think the biggest thing he would have to handle and adjust to is after that first time, after the first game, what your body feels like,” Weddle said. “Because you’re basically training for those impact plays and getting fallen on and tackling people. You can’t simulate getting double-teamed to the ground, or like you’re underneath the pile of six dudes like those guys are a lot of the time, or running down and jumping for a tackle on the sideline and you’re doing a somersault. I think that it will be more of a like after the game how that’s going to feel, where for me it was prepping for the game.

“I could manage who I hit, who I didn’t hit, tackling, throwing it in there. But him, he has to hit every single play. So much more physicality, shoulders, hips, punching, those type of things would be much more difficult.”

The Super Bowl he played in with the Rams would mark Eric Weddle’s lone Super Bowl victory. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

• There is, for sure, a psychological piece as well. Weddle made six Pro Bowls, was twice first-team All-Pro and three times second team All-Pro. He told himself, through all that, that when he couldn’t be that type of player anymore, he’d retire. Donald was a Pro Bowler in all 10 of his NFL seasons, and first-team All-Pro eight times, so the same train of thought—or even more so—would likely exist with him.

“For him, his legacy, he’s going to be one of the best ever. Now do you go back and you’re getting blocked by some random (guy)? Are you going to be OK with that?” Weddle said. “There’s just a lot to think about. And for me, I thought about that stuff, like I don’t want to fall flat on my face. But the good thing was, basically, I was able to practice and they brought me up for the games and at any point if I couldn’t do it, or I felt like physically I couldn’t handle it, I could have just went home.”

Which, of course, was easier to do because he hadn’t signed up for more than just a few weeks. And if Donald signs up for more than that, this idea would be part of the calculus.

• Finally, there’s the longer-term damage that could be done, and the idea of how it could affect Donald’s quality of life after he made it out of a career already in good shape—and in the type of condition that gives him the shot to even think about pulling this off. Weddle, for his part, came out of his 13-year career in similarly good condition. And the six weeks he tacked on in January and February of 2022, he says, did come at a cost.

“I still am feeling it, if I’m being honest,” he says. “I mean, my knees, my back, my neck, obviously my pec, my hips, like I had all those anyway. But coming off the couch from not doing anything preparation-wise for two years and then playing? I think it’s definitely set me back, health-wise. No doubt about it.”

Weddle recalls getting called over to the sideline after the most arduous practice of that 2021 postseason by McVay and Morris, who told him he looked good.

“Yeah, I feel pretty good,” Weddle responded. “Should be good to go on Sunday.”

“You’re gonna play the whole game, right?” one of them said, with a smile.

“And I’m like, are you guys out of your mind? I won’t last a quarter if you want to throw me out there for the whole game. Let’s stick to the plan and gear up,” Weddle said. “And they both had it envisioned that I’m playing the whole game and I’m running the defense just because of the leadership aspect, but also just how much my mind could help the defense. It was a shock to everyone else, but that was kind of what we were gearing up toward.”

Indeed, McVay and Morris were right, and Weddle wound up surprising even himself.

He played 19 snaps, all on passing downs, against the Cardinals in the wild-card round. Then he went 61 snaps against Tampa, before playing every defensive snap in the NFC title game against San Francisco, then wearing the green dot on his helmet and playing every snap of the Rams’ Super Bowl LVI win.

But it wasn’t easy, not by a longshot. He strained his hamstring on David Long’s pick-six in Arizona, then played through that and a sore groin in Tampa.

“Going into that game, I was like, ‘I don’t know how many plays I got in me, my hammy’s tender, my groin,” Weddle remembered, “but we played on grass, and I think that made a huge difference.” He was, by his estimation, about 70% for that game. Then, the next week, in the second quarter against the Niners, he turned to get over the top of Jalen Ramsey in a cover-4 look and grabbed his hamstring.

“So that whole game, I’m playing at like 80%,” he said, “because I know if I opened up, I would tear my hammy.”

After, Weddle ruptured his pec on the eighth play of the Super Bowl, and reinjured his hamstring and groin on the final series of that final win over the Bengals.

The result, of course, again, made it all worth it. But it took plenty to get through all of it.

Eric Weddle is done with the NFL after the Super Bowl 👀 pic.twitter.com/U6k0HQEuTz

— ESPN (@espn) February 4, 2022

And for what it’s worth, Weddle wholeheartedly believes Donald has what it takes to do the same. Which leaves the most obvious question on the table: how badly he wants to go through with it.

“I think he could go play right now,” he said. “It’s just, man, taking on double teams. And then, the next day, I mean, after the Niners game, I didn’t sleep for two days, I was in so much pain. And then it was the realization of that’s why I retired. This is the reason. I think he can handle all that. I think he could. I don’t know for how long he would want to, but he’s mentally, physically the elite of the elite, so he can handle all that.

“It’s just whether he wants to or not. I think ultimately that’s up to him.”

And if he’s really, truly considering it, clearly, he’s got a lot to think about.

Of course, then, there’s the chance that in February, it’ll all have been worth it.

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