When the Pittsburgh Steelers came back from halftime last week against the Oakland Raiders, they did so without their starting quarterback on the field. Ben Roethlisberger suffered a rib injury late in the first half, and he was relieved by backup Josh Dobbs.
Roethlisberger didn't even show up on the sideline until about midway through the third quarter, and he stayed there until the Raiders took a lead and the Steelers needed to make a comeback. Roethlisberger eventually led a go-ahead drive, but the Raiders came right back and scored themselves, and ultimately won the game.
(Stream Patriots-Steelers and all other CBS games on CBS All Access and all of Sunday's games on fuboTV, try it for free)
There was quite a bit of mystery and controversy surrounding Roethlisberger's absence and eventual return to the game, as coach Mike Tomlin changed his explanation for why Roethlisberger didn't come in earlier from "we were in the rhythm and flow of the game" to Roethlisberger took a pain-killing injection at halftime and the Steelers had to wait for it to kick in.
Here we are a few days later, and now we finally know what Roethlisberger's actual injury was: cracked ribs, according to NFL Network's Ian Rapoport.
From @gmfb Weekend: Unlike that faulty X-Ray machine, I can actually tell you: #Steelers QB Ben Roethlisberger did, in fact, have cracked ribs last week. Mystery solved. pic.twitter.com/iTEJMtsNrc
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) December 16, 2018
Supposedly, the X-ray machine in Oakland did not give the Steelers a good or timely reading of the injury, which was a partial cause of the delay in getting him back into the game. This prompted Steelers officials to tell Rapoport, "If it's something crazy, it probably happens in Oakland." And that actually is the only part of this whole saga that makes perfect sense.
