Can the NFL ever be the same after Damar Hamlin’s shocking collapse on ‘Monday Night Football’?
The biggest game of the NFL season gave way Monday night to the most terrifying nationally televised moment in league history when Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin faced a life-or-death emergency on the field.
Hamlin tackled Bengals receiver Tee Higgins, rose to his feet, adjusted his facemask and collapsed onto his back as medical personnel rushed onto the field to administer CPR. He was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital, where he was in critical condition, according to the NFL, and put to “sleep to put a breathing tube down his throat,” after his vital signs were stabilized, according to his friend and marketing rep Jordon Rooney of Jaster Athletes.
The rest of this NFL season — and maybe the future of football — changed in that moment. A Bills-Bengals game rich with playoff implications was suspended as coaches appeared to take matters into their own hands and pull their teams off the field to go back to the locker room because players were either shocked or in tears. It is unclear when those teams — or any players around the NFL — will take the field again.
Detroit Lions receiver Chuck Hughes died of cardiac arrest on Oct. 23, 1971 after collapsing on the field only a few plays after he was tackled in a game against Chicago. The teams continued to play after he was carried off on a stretcher, treated in the tunnel of Tiger Stadium and taken to a local hospital.