Melbourne coach Steven King has confirmed injured forward Brody Mihocek has returned home and is walking around after an operation on a neck fracture he suffered on Monday.
Mihocek was tackled by former teammate Billy Frampton - which drew an initial three-game suspension that was overturned at the Tribunal - during the King's Birthday clash, and landed awkwardly on his neck, resulting in the injury.
"He's home," King said.
"He's very, very lucky. Obviously post operation, back home, walking around, which is amazing and a terrific result of what could've been.
"He's coming to terms where he's at at the moment. It was pretty bad. I've seen some lower limb injuries in my time that have been pretty horrific but that one was next level in terms of potential serious repercussions."
Tuesday's Tribunal hearing ultimately cleared Frampton of the three-game ban, with the Pies arguing Mihocek contributed to the outcome due to his driving force to get out of the tackle.
King wanted to assure his forward he was the "victim" of the nasty incident, and also felt like reaching out to the Collingwood defender.
"I didn't follow the Tribunal. It was irrelevant," King said.
"All my thoughts and prayers are with Brody and his family, but I felt like reaching out to Billy as well. I feel like he was playing the game as well.
"It's one of those terrible accidents. I feel for both. But coaching Brody, and what he's going through physically, I'm making sure we all support him and he hasn't done anything wrong in this accident."
"We all have to be careful and mindful that it was a football incident, but Brody is probably feeling guilt around him contributing to this as well.
"I feel like we have to make sure that we understand that Brody is the victim in all of this. I don't think he contributed to the incident at all. I think he's just playing the game.
"But he's the one at home at the moment, in a neck brace, millimetres from potential disaster."
King is weighing up bringing in Jake Melksham to fill the forward line void left by Mihocek, while Max Heath and Matthew Jefferson produced strong VFL outings last week.
