Sheldon Rankins lost 50 pounds, lost most of his 2024 season to viral infections
While the New Orleans Saints weren’t known for drafting many defensive playmakers early in the 2010’s, they did turn things around once Jeff Ireland took over their college scouting department. One of his first hits was Sheldon Rankins, who proved to be an exceptional talent both with New Orleans and on other teams when he and the Saints parted ways. Rankins was a core pieces of the team’s most prolific defenses in the late 2010s that helped the franchise compete in the playoffs when their offense began to run out of steam.
Rankins ultimately did end up leaving the Saints after five seasons and 63 games played, heading to the New York Jets, the Houston Texans, and the Cincinnati Bengals from 2021 to 2024. Now, he has reunited with the Texans for 2025, as he looks to have a chance once again at picking up a solid role. He’s remained productive with 13 sacks in 53 games since leaving New Orleans, but Rankins struggled with a major health scare during his last year in Cincinnati. These days he’s just grateful to be on a football field again.
“Yeah, so, dealt with some health stuff last year,” Rankins began, speaking with Texans beat reporters after a July 28 training camp practice. “I guess the biggest one that took me out of playing, which was I ended up having a shingles outbreak and viral meningitis at the same time. That kind of knocked me out for a while. So y’know, a lot of people don’t know, and a lot of people thought ‘Oh what type of illness, or what type of thing can have someone out for this long?’ A lot of people don’t know, I was literally laying horizontal in my house, in a dark house, for probably about a month and a half before I could really even sit up without feeling kind of crazy.”
Rankins was only able to play in the Bengals’ first two games last season before he was sidelined for three weeks with a hamstring injury, and he returned for another five games before being shut down for the season due to these viral infections. He didn’t know it at the time, but he had already played his last game for Cincinnati.
“Started the season last year probably around 300 pounds, by the end of dealing with all of that, along with some other things, I was probably down to 255. Lost all of my strength, lost all the weight, power. Even by the time I played my last game, on Nov. 7 against Baltimore, I was low 270s, high 260s, so wasn’t myself last year. By the grace of God I’m able to still come out here, and compete, and do things at a high level. I worked my (expletive) off this offseason to ensure, not only physically that I can come out here and play, but mentally I was past a lot of this stuff, and health-wise internally that I was able to check things off my list and get back to feeling great. Because I know when I feel great, I can be a difference-maker,” Rankins finished.
Thankfully, Rankins is back in a position where he is able to play once again and is healthy enough to do so. Any type of health scare for players is a difficult time all-around, but something like viral meningitis is a completely different beast than some of the on-field injuries. It is great to hear that he has since been able to work through that and is now back to doing what he loves, and hopefully, he has some great opportunities in Houston to make plays once again.