Green Bay Packers wide receiver Christian Watson took an ambulance ride to a local hospital after suffering an injury during Thursday night's win over the Carolina Panthers, but precautionary testing on Watson's chest came back with good news, so he rode the ambulance back to Lambeau Field and finished the game without complication.
Watson explained the wild sequence, which started with him landing hard on the football at the end of his 53-yard catch in the second quarter and ended with Watson returning in the same ambulance he took to the hospital, running back onto the field to the roar of the crowd and catching two passes after being cleared to return from the frightening injury.
From Watson in the post-game locker room: "I think I just came
down on the ball, or my elbow or something. I couldn't breathe on the field, got the wind knocked out of me. Got back to the sideline and was spitting up blood, so the doctor said I had to go get a CT. I was begging him to not make me do that, but it is what it is. Everything looked good, just got a rib, that's all, all the major stuff was all good, no internal bleeding or anything like that, so I was able to get back out there."
Watson said he has a broken rib. He wore extra padding and a molding around his ribs to protect the injury when he returned.
On the Prime Video broadcast, Watson told Kaylee Hartung that he was checking the doctor's play-by-play of the game while at the hospital. He was gone from the stadium for roughly an hour while being evaluated.
The main concern -- and the reason for a quick ambulance ride to the hospital -- was the blood and the potential for an internal injury as a result of the broken rib. Unlike a standard X-ray, a CT scan can provide a better look at the rib and the soft tissues and organs surrounding the rib, allowing the physician to quickly diagnose any potential serious complications.
Watson got the all clear and returned to the stadium. He re-entered the field midway through the third quarter.
The Prime Video team was able to broadcast the whole ordeal, including Watson getting into the ambulance after the injury and getting out of the ambulance upon his return to Lambeau Field.
The Internet took it from there:
Christian Watson returning from the hospital in the 2nd half pic.twitter.com/fZ90Cffyxi
— GhettoGronk (@ghetto_gronk) October 30, 2026
BAH GAWD IT'S STONE COLD SCOOT WATSON pic.twitter.com/OVQLmHEtoL
— CheeseheadTV 🧀 (@cheeseheadtv) October 30, 2026
The shots of the ambulance were straight out of Attitude Era WWE.
Watson called it a "surreal experience."
Christian Watson on returning to play after going to the hospital for coughing up blood/breaking a rib: “I felt like I was watching a WWE Smackdown vs. Raw or something out there. Seeing the cameras on me when I was coming out the ambulance, that was a little crazy. It was a… pic.twitter.com/IgKLeiYrfU
— Matt Schneidman (@mattschneidman) October 30, 2026
Watson finished with eight catches for 113 yards on 10 targets, including a 24-yard catch on 3rd-and-8 to extend the Packers' first touchdown drive and the 53-yard catch setting up the second touchdown. He also had a crucial third down conversion late in the fourth quarter, allowing the Packers to kill off most of the remaining clock before punting the ball back to the Panthers.
This article originally appeared on Packers Wire: Why did Packers WR Christian Watson take an ambulance to and from the hospital on TNF?
