The NFL Needs Victor Cruz Back

Will Victor Cruz ever be great again?

He's been gone so long, it's easy to forget he ever was. He was. Victor Cruz was once unstoppable.      

Think back to 2011. He was one of the most dominant forces in the sport. He was impossible to cover, a combination of speed and precision deep-route running. Remember the 99-yard touchdown? In the second-to-last game of the season, with the Giants needing every point as they pushed for the playoffs? He had 164 yards in that game. Remember what he did the next game? Against Dallas? With the playoffs at stake? He had 178 yards.

Cruz finished that year with nine touchdowns and 1,536 yards on just 82 catches and was a catalyst yet again in the NFC title game, with 10 catches for 142 yards.

He was that good. He was better than good. Great.

Then, the injuries came, and this is a common story in the long history of a violent sport. A hot start, a promising career and then the body fails. There was the torn right knee tendon last year in Week 6 that ended his season. Then a strained left calf that has led to Cruz not playing this season. We're in Week 8, and still no sign of him.

Matt Rourke/Associated Press

Cruz has spent the past few years in a state of perpetual recovery. In some ways, his Showtime documentary, I Am Giant: Victor Cruz, which debuts this week, is a reflection of that continued comeback. The film documents his life and rise to stardom, and it was quite a meteoric rise.

The movie is inspiring and entertaining, but in many ways it—and Cruz himself—illustrates just how vicious the sport can be. The fact Cruz hasn't played a down since Week 6 of 2014 shows you what the violence can do to the body. Whether it's a knee, a calf, a concussion or a hamstring, an ankle or a shoulder, dozens of things can fell what are seemingly impervious athletes.

When I spoke to Cruz on Tuesday, he reminded me that he had a concussion two years ago, which led to the compromise all football players have to make in order to exist in the sport.

"Do I worry about that concussion?" Cruz said. "Yes. God forbid I get any more. How would it affect my mind?" He paused. "But I can't think about it," he said.

That's the compromise. Think about it, and you start to wonder: What the hell am I doing? So instead players have to blank out the potential repercussions of playing football, even as they're dealing with them. They don't have a choice.

If somehow Cruz can piece his body back together, and even be 80 percent of what he was, he can transform that Giants offense. He can take the pressure off Odell Beckham Jr. and give Eli Manning another viable target.

He can, literally, also transform the division. The NFC East is awful, and the Giants can still win it if Cruz can be Cruz again. Yeah, he was that good.

Kathy Willens/Associated Press

The Giants are missing that second explosive weapon on offense. In fact, I'd say every team in the division is. Beckham is the only receiver in the division (18th) in the top 25 in the league in receiving yards, and no team has more than one receiver in the top 40. The division's top running back? Eagles backup Ryan Mathews has the most rushing yards (20th overall), and next is the Cowboys' Joseph Randle (23rd), who may not play football again this season.

It's abysmal in the NFC East right now, which is why whatever team can put together some kind of offensive run can capture it.

Who knows if Cruz will play again this season, but if the Giants can get maybe the last five or six games of the year out of him, they would have that extra offensive piece no other team in the NFC East has.

Which brings us back to the original question: Will Victor Cruz ever be great again?

Mike Freeman covers the NFL for Bleacher Report.