Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa told reporters on Wednesday he was knocked unconscious after suffering a head injury during a game against the Cincinnati Bengals on Sept. 29.
“I wouldn’t say it was scary for me at the time because there was a point where I was unconscious,” Tagovailoa said after a reporter asked him if the hit was scary to him. “I couldn’t tell what was going on.”
“When I did come to, and kind of realized what was going on … what was happening, I didn’t think of anything long-term or short-term,” Tagovailoa continued. “I was just wondering what happened.”
Tagovailoa said he remembers everything up until the point “where I got tackled.”
The 24-year-old also said he didn’t remember getting carted off the field by EMS, but he did remember “things that were going on when I was in the ambulance and when I arrived at the hospital.”
Tagovailoa suffered the injury when he was sacked by Bengals’ defensive tackle Josh Tupou, which caused Tagovailoa’s head to bounce off the turf, leaving him frozen flat on the field while his hands cramped uncontrollably for several minutes.
His finger movements were a “fencing response,” which occurs when a person is knocked down with significant impact to their head during contact sports, according to Healthline.
Just days earlier, Tagovailoa had been injured in a Sept. 25 game against the Buffalo Bills. He was allowed to return to that game after clearing concussion protocols, with officials determining the quarterback had injured his back, not his head.
But in light of the incident in the Bengals game, the NFL Players Association, or NFLPA, launched an investigation to determine whether the Dolphins were following the league’s concussion protocol during the Bills game. As a result of the probe, the unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant who assessed Tagovailoa during the Bills game on Sept. 25 was fired, according to The Associated Press.
“The Protocol exists to establish a high standard of concussion care for each player whereby every medical professional engages in a meaningful and rigorous examination of the player-patent,” an Oct. 8 joint statement from the NFL and NFLPA reads. “To that end, the parties remain committed to continuing to evaluate our Protocol to ensure it reflects the intended conservative approach to evaluating player-patients for potential head injuries.”
Tagovailoa is expected to return to the field against the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday after clearing concussion protocol last week.