FOXBOROUGH, Mass. _ The Carolina Panthers' entire 2019 season was thrown into doubt late in the first quarter Thursday night when quarterback Cam Newton went down in a heap in a preseason game at New England.
This was the Panthers' nightmare threatening to come to life _ their franchise quarterback hurt, again, before he ever threw a regular-season pass.
The play _ only Newton's 11th of the game, and of his entire preseason _ ended in an awkward-looking sack following a scramble. The team quickly announced he had a foot injury and would not return, minutes after the quarterback walked off the field under his own power, surrounded by medical personnel.
Before that, Newton had thrown six passes in the game's first 11 minutes and looked like himself. His arm seemed fine in limited work. He bounced around, full of energy, during pregame warmups.
But then came the play, in which Newton darted around in the pocket, no one came open, and his lower left leg was eventually wrapped up by Patriots' defensive lineman Adam Butler. Newton went down. He then tossed the ball to the official and jogged off the field a little gimpy.
Newton has taken many hits harder than that one from Butler, even if you only count those in preseason. He broke a rib on this same artificial-turf field at Gillette Stadium in 2014, and last year in an exhibition game he landed on his head and missed four plays.
But although this didn't look terrible _ and maybe it won't be _ foot injuries don't have to look bad initially to turn out poorly. Panthers tight end Greg Olsen and many other NFL players could tell you.
Hopefully, that's not what happened here. Hopefully the Panthers were just being careful and in a few days Newton will be throwing again in practice.
But we also may not know the answers to these two questions for days or even a couple of weeks:
1. Will Newton be well enough to start Sept. 8 in the home opener vs. the L.A. Rams?
2. If he can't, is Kyle Allen ready to play?
A play like this sack was exactly the reason I advocated two weeks ago in this space for Newton not to play a single snap in this preseason. The Panthers already sat him out for the first and second preseason games and they always sit him out for the fourth one. Why not just make it a clean sweep and sit him for the third one, too?
Of course, you could argue that Tom Brady is the best quarterback of all time and he, like Newton, played exactly three offensive series Thursday night. I would argue that Brady _ who led a touchdown drive on his third series for the only points of the first half _ shouldn't have been playing, either.
But even when he does play, Brady plays a lower-risk sort of game _ he doesn't hold the ball long, and he mostly just throws the ball out of bounds and resets if he gets into trouble.
I'm not blaming anyone for this injury.
Newton didn't mean to get hurt; he was just trying to make a play. Head coach Ron Rivera certainly didn't want his star quarterback hurt; he was just trying to get him a few snaps before the season opener. The Patriots weren't trying to hurt Newton, either; they are paid to sack the quarterback, and the hits that Newton took on the play were legal and didn't draw any flags.
But the bottom line is that it happened. And now the Panthers have to deal with exactly the sort of uncertainty they didn't want entering their 25th season.
Cam Newton is hurt, again _ and no one knows exactly what will come next.
