NFL teams receive encouraging update on Caleb Banks ahead of draft originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
A letter sent to teams on Wednesday confirmed that Florida defensive tackle Caleb Banks is "on pace to be fully cleared for full football activities in early June." The update comes after a CT scan earlier this week, and it lands a day before the 2026 NFL Draft kicks off in Pittsburgh.
For teams weighing a first-round pick on Banks, this is probably the best possible answer to the question hanging over his evaluation.
He fractured the fourth metatarsal in his left foot the night before the NFL Combine in February while running starts in the dark, kept going, and then showed up the next day and ran a 5.04-second 40-yard dash on a broken bone.
NEWS: NFL teams received a letter today about Caleb Banks as he recovers from a surgically repaired bone in his left foot. Per ESPN sources, the letter states that after a CT scan on Tuesday that Banks is “on pace to be fully cleared for full football activities in early June.” pic.twitter.com/FlrO8obUAw
That is either the most impressive thing a prospect has done in this pre-draft cycle or a preview of exactly the kind of stubbornness that keeps players healthy exactly long enough to get hurt again. Teams can argue either side.
This is his third foot injury in roughly twelve months, all involving thesame foot.
He missed the first two games of Florida's 2025 season because of it, re-injured it against LSU in September, and then cracked the metatarsal again in Indianapolis. The surgery in early March was his second in six months.
An early June clearance puts Banks in a realistic spot for training camp, though OTAs are likely gone and mandatory minicamp may be touch-and-go.
He is still a first-round talent by most evaluations. None of the injury noise has fully knocked him out of round one.
NFL.com had him going 15th overall to Tampa Bay as recently as a few weeks ago.
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