Christian Watson broke a rib on the play that sent him to the hospital Thursday night, the Packers receiver said after Green Bay’s 27-19 win over the Carolina Panthers. He said a CT scan found no internal bleeding, which is why doctors cleared him to come back and finish the game.
Watson shared the diagnosis himself after the game, according to ESPN. During the game, the team had only described it as a chest injury and called the hospital trip precautionary. On “SportsCenter With Scott Van Pelt,” Watson put it simply: “I think I just landed on the ball, it got me in the ribs.”
So, what happened?
Watson got hurt in the second quarter on a collision just after he had hauled in a 53-yard catch. He left the stadium in an ambulance, and he told reporters he had been spitting up some blood, so the medical staff wanted the scan to rule out anything more serious, Yahoo Sports reported. Watson said he told the staff before he even left that he wanted to get back out there.
He did. Watson already had six catches for 100 yards before the injury and finished with eight for 113, including a late third-down conversion. That puts him at 42 catches for 708 yards through eight games, both career highs, per The Associated Press.
Carolina came out of the same collision with a problem of its own. Cornerback Will Lee III was carted to the locker room with a hamstring injury and didn’t return.
The Packers haven’t given an official update on Watson’s status beyond the in-game announcement, and none of the postgame reports included a timeline. The Thursday game does give Green Bay a few extra days before it plays again.
Why it matters
Here’s McGraw Media’s read: watching a player leave in an ambulance is scary, and the good news is the scan ruled out the worst. At the same time, a broken rib is still a real injury for a receiver who takes hits over the middle, and Watson is having the most productive stretch of his career. Green Bay’s next injury report will tell us a lot more than any guess can. Until then, there’s no sense in worrying sick. He finished the game, and that’s the best sign we have.
This story was drafted with AI assistance and fact-checked by McGraw Media.
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