Cameron Rising gave permission for the surgeon who performed his knee surgery back in January, Dr. Neal ElAttrache, to speak to The Athletic’s Christopher Kamrani about his recovery, and the premier orthopedic knee surgeon revealed it might still be a week or two before the Utah quarterback is able to make his season debut.

ElAttrache said Rising “is close” but there are still a few benchmarks he needs to see before clearing a return to play.

“He’s gaining on it,” ElAttrache told Kamrani. “I don’t know if it’s going to be a week or two weeks. Cam is close, but there’s a few things that we really need to still see before we can have him go back as safe as possible at this point. We’re not even going to be nine months from the surgery until the 16th of this month. Until he gets some of his power and mechanics refined, this last phase of the return to competition — or what I call return to performance — happens at different paces in different people.”

All season, Rising’s timeline seems to have been distorted publicly. He wasn’t ruled out until hours before the season opener against Florida, and that “will he, won’t he” song and dance continued each week until, during Utah’s bye week, Rising went on ESPN700 and disclosed the exact extent of the knee injury he suffered.

It wasn’t just an ACL tear. He essentially blew out his knee joint. Rising tore his ACL, his MCL, his MPFL, and his meniscus.

Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham hasn’t publicly discussed a firm timetable for a recovery, but he has left the door open on a return each week. As those games have passed — and Utah’s offense has looked more and more lifeless — fans have grown more and more frustrated.

Last week, ElAttrache received a one-star Google review that simply said, “Let Cam play.” ElAttrache told The Athletic Rising expressed the feeling to him on several occasions during training camp that Rising would be letting Utah down if he missed games.

The West Coast doctor has no obligation to help Utah win football games. And Whittingham’s sole obligation is to win football games. The two are naturally going to be at odds, to some extent. But ElAttrache told The Athletic he isn’t looking for Rising to simply be able to return to the field, he needs Rising’s knee to be secure “in a very unsafe sport.”

The Athletic report from Kamrani noted that ElAttrache is now focused on how Rising’s knee responds to fatigue. When he cuts or decelerates in the fourth quarter, will one leg be weaker than the other?

“I kept saying, ‘Cam, you’re forgetting where you are in this thing. The strength of that ligament healing and maturing is not where I need it to be if you do the types of things you’re going to need to do in an instant on the field,'” ElAttrache told Kamrani. “He has this inner feeling he’s got a responsibility to the team and to his coach and he wants to compete as soon as possible. He wants to do it. He’s counting on me and trusting me that I will look out for him and I’ll protect him from him, to some degree. That’s my priority.”

Meanwhile, Utah has to prepare for Cal.

Whittingham said during the bye that he would like to get an answer on Rising’s availability early in the week as opposed to later in the week, which is what the program had been doing initially.

Asked Monday if he had an update, Whittingham said no.

“If somebody can give me one reason why it would help us win more to announce it, then I’ll tell you everything,” Whittingham said at his weekly news conference. “But I can’t think of one thing. If you think of one thing, let me know because I’d be excited to hear it.”

Whittingham said Rising will continue to be involved in practice throughout the week regardless of what his availability is, but if he is still not cleared, then his involvement in team periods will be “scaled way back” as those reps will go to the No. 1 and No. 2 quarterbacks for the week.

Brandon Rose is available, Whittingham said. Bryson Barnes’ availability is still unknown.

Lots of moving pieces. Utah hosts Cal at noon PT on Saturday. On Oct. 21, the Utes head to Los Angeles to face No. 10 USC. When it comes home from that game, No. 8 Oregon comes to town on Oct. 28.

The gauntlet has arrived.