Last week on “Thursday Night Football,” Tua Tagovailoa‘s concussion became huge news. Part of the story was a clip of him, four days before, stumbling and needing to be held up against the Buffalo Bills.
That’s why it was scary to see the same thing happen to Indianapolis Colts running back Nyheim Hines less than two minutes into this week’s Thursday night game.
On the third offensive play of the game, Hines caught a pass and was hit by a couple of Denver Broncos. It didn’t look like a particularly violent hit. But as Hines got up, his legs gave out. He was being held up, wobbly after the tackle he took. It was impossible, after a week of discussion on Tagovailoa and head injuries in the NFL, to not have flashbacks.
“Uh oh, uh oh,” play-by-play announcer Al Michaels said on the Amazon Prime Video broadcast. “Of all things.”
“Oh, boy,” color commentator Kirk Herbstreit said.
Hines was helped off and headed to the locker room almost immediately. Before the end of the first quarter Hines was ruled out, according to multiple reports.
Head injuries are a part of football. That’s not going away. But the NFL probably didn’t need a stark reminder of last week’s horrible injury just a few plays into this week’s Thursday night game.
