ALAMEDA – DJ Hayden doesn’t love talking about himself in general, especially when health is a topic on the table. He’s been through too many injuries in his young NFL career, given too many progress updates on heart issues, surgical complications, fractured feet and groin strains far too often for that to be fun. That discussion normally devolves into what he can’t do, how he’s hindered injury and, later, how that impacts the former first-round pick's performance.
Hayden couldn't care less what outsiders think, but all the ailments would wear on even the toughest psyche.
Injuries were a common thread for two seasons, as he dealt with aftereffects of a major heart condition coming out of the draft and then a sequence of maddening football injuries that kept him out of 14 games in that span.