The Las Vegas Raiders announced Friday they have placed defensive tackle Christian Wilkins on the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list. The former Clemson star suffered a season-ending foot injury last season.
Wilkins has been rehabbing from a broken foot that cut his 2024 season short last October. He suffered the injury in Week 5 and was placed on injured reserve after undergoing surgery for a Jones fracture.
As noted by Raiders.com, players on the PUP list can return at any time during training camp and the preseason. However, if they are still on the PUP list after the 53-man roster deadline, they must miss at least four games before being eligible to return.
The Raiders report to training camp on July 22. NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported Friday that Wilkins has been “making sound progress recently.”
In late June, The Athletic’s Tashan Reed posted a photo showing Wilkins with a walking boot on his left foot at Baltimore Ravens linebacker Kyle Van Noy’s charity golf challenge. Back in May, Raiders head coach Pete Carroll said Wilkins was “in the midst of a long, challenging” recovery process.
“It’s been a difficult recovery and he’s done everything he needs to do,” Carroll said. “He’s been here every day. He’s here early working hard. But we’re still working it, and he’s not ready to get back out.”
“We’re in the midst of a long, challenging process,” Carroll added. “Fortunately, there’s a lot of time, and we’re going to take every bit of it. We’ve really tried to be really diligent about the way we’ve worked it and the way we’ve monitored it and all of that, and he’s been on board the whole time. But it has been challenging.”
Wilkins, 29, agreed to a massive four-year, $110 million deal with the Raiders last offseason prior to the 2024 season, making him the second-highest paid defensive tackle in the league.
The 6-foot-4, 310-pounder recorded 17 tackles (two for loss), two sacks and six quarterback hits over five games with the Raiders last season prior to his season-ending injury.
A 2019 first-round pick (13th overall), Wilkins spent the first five years of his NFL career with the Miami Dolphins and amassed 355 tackles, 20.5 sacks and 43 tackles for loss over 81 career games (77 starts) during his time in Miami. He hadn’t missed a game since 2020 before his injury on Oct. 6 against the Denver Broncos.