Oregon takes a painful but temporary hit

LaMichael James was doing quite well Thursday night (239 yards in three quarters) until a relatively normal-looking tackle by a Cal defensive lineman resulted in his arm doing something it wasn't designed to do. It was one of the most horrific injuries I've ever seen (you've been warned):


The cart came out, the air cast went on, the fans chanted "LaMichael Ja-ames," etc. I felt awful, and not because I just somebody's arm bend backwards. I mean, that arm's freakin' broken.

Amazingly/incredibly/unbelievably/remarkably, that arm is NOT freakin' broken:

Afterward, he said that X-rays showed there was no break. He had his arm in a sling.

It was only a dislocation, so the diagnosis goes from "out for a while, like maybe the rest of the season" to "week to week." That's not so bad.

Here's Oregon's remaining schedule:

Arizona State
@ Colorado
Washington State
@ Washington
@ Stanford
USC
Oregon State

Assuming they can get past Arizona State next weekend -- which isn't guaranteed without James but is still likely -- they should be in the clear until the kinda-sorta-important Stanford game on November 5, and James should easily be back to 100 percent by then; a month seems more than sufficient for a dislocated elbow. The interim is just Pac-12 filler material anyway since there's no way a one-loss Pac-12 team is going to the BCS title game.

In short: Cease panic (unless you're a Stanford fan, in which case cease rejoicing).