Oct 4, 2015 1 min read

Lost in Thursday night’s debacle against the Ravens was the fact that Ben Roethlisberger was permitted to be on the sideline.

Roethlisberger had said earlier in the week that head coach Mike Tomlin had a rule that nobody on crutches is permitted on the sideline.

Roethlisberger was not on crutches and was on the sideline against the Ravens.

Having seen Roethlisberger earlier in the week, it was surprising. He was in obvious pain moving around the team’s practice facility on Tuesday and needed the crutches to get around.

That was not the case Thursday.

While the MCL sprain is obviously a problem, there were some in the organization who felt the bone bruise might the thing that kept Roethlisberger out for more than four weeks – the typical healing time for an MCL sprain.

The fact that Roethlisberger was able to capably – and apparently painlessly – on the sideline Thursday night shows the bone bruise might not have been as bad as previously thought.

Roethlisberger could, in fact, be back in three more weeks.