When it comes to ribs, my preference is to talk about how they’re seasoned and brushed with sauce on a summer Saturday afternoon — and not how they are fractured within the body of my favorite team’s rookie quarterback.
That’s just a personal preference, but I digress.
Justin Fields’ ribs injury is serious to keep him out of Thursday’s Thanksgiving throw-down against the Lions, but the expectation is that the Bears QB won’t be out too long:
Sources: #Bears QB Justin Fields, already ruled out today, suffered a few cracked ribs on Sunday, further testing revealed. The X-Ray and CT scans were clean, but the MRI showed the additional issues. They are tiny fractures, not deemed major, and Fields should return shortly.
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) November 25, 2021
In a week full of so. much. gosh. darn. dang. drama. here. … it’s nice to have some good news worth sharing.
NFL Network insider Ian Rapoport reports it was an MRI — and not X-Ray or CT scans — that ultimately showed Fields having injured ribs. Rapoport adds the injuries are “tiny fractures, not deemed major.” I suppose that’s easy for anyone to say they’re not major injuries when it’s not their ribs. But I digress, because Rap wraps up his tweet with what might be the most important news nugget being that Fields “should return shortly.”
Thinking long term, perhaps the Bears should thank their lucky stars they’re playing on a short turn-around. No, playing the early Thursday morning game after playing on Sunday isn’t ideal. Neither is playing without your starting quarterback. But because Chicago plays today and not Sunday, Fields will get 13 days between going down with his injury and the next possible game he can play. In other words, if this injury isn’t major, then we’re looking at an extended amount of time off for rest and rehabilitation for the team’s most important player moving forward. And that is far more important than playing a game between teams FiveThirtyEight projects have less than a 1 percent chance of making the playoffs.