What happened to Patriots CB Isaiah Bolden?

During a preseason game on Saturday, August 19th against the Green Bay Packers, Patriots rookie cornerback Isaiah Bolden went down with a scary injury after colliding helmets with a fellow Patriots teammate. He was motionless on the floor, and he was eventually carted off of the field. So what happened to him? Is he okay? Let's discuss.

Bolden sustained a hit to the lower-right side of his helmet during the play. When comparing the location of the impact to the structure of the brain, you can see that he suffered trauma to the right side cerebellum and the spinal cord.

• The cerebellum is a structure in your brain found under the majority of the brain (the four brain lobes). The cerebellum is mainly responsible for muscle control like movement or balance.

• The spinal cord is a structure in the brain that lies below the majority of the brain (the four brain lobes) and to the side of the cerebellum. The spinal cord sends signals to your brain that cause you to move around and have reflexes.

When the head gets hit hard near the area of the cerebellum/spinal cord, many can become motionless and even suffer long-lasting or even permanent damage to those structures, impairing their ability to move around on a day-to-day basis. The best example of this is former NFL linebacker Ryan Shazier, who suffered an injury to his spinal cord during a football game, which left him partially paralyzed. Isaiah Bolden suffered a similar hit to Shazier's, as he too was left motionless on the field.

However, thankfully, Bolden's injury isn't as severe. After the game, reports came out that Bolden had full feeling in his arms and legs, and he was taken to a local Green Bay hospital as a precaution. In fact, he traveled back home with the Patriots on Sunday. The official injury report states he suffered a concussion, which would explain his becoming motionless on the field and having to be carted off. A similar case to Bolden's is Dolphin quarterback Tua Tagovailoa suffering a concussion in a regular season game in the 2022-2023 season against the Cincinnati Bengals. Both players received hits to the back of the head, and both had to be carted off the field. Bolden's concussion, thankfully, isn't as severe. He didn't report losing consciousness, and he didn't display a fencing response (check out this article to learn what a fencing response is: https://chaganisaheel.wixsite.com/the-medbook/post/why-tua-tagovailoa-continuing-to-play-football-is-very-very-risky ), which tells us his concussion isn't as extreme as the one suffered by Tua.

Now what does this mean for Bolden? Well, seeing as how he had to be carted off the field, it is safe to assume that he will be managed extremely carefully by the Patriots, so it's safe to assume that he'll miss the last week of the preseason. He most likely won't need to miss Week 1 of the regular season, but I wouldn't be surprised if the Patriots decided to play very safe and rest him until then, mainly because of the various injury scares we saw last season like Damar Hamlin and Tua Tagovailoa. The bottom line is that Bolden will be okay to play football in the future, just don't be surprised if he misses extended time as the Patriots will most likely try to play it very safe with his injury.

Thankfully, the latest reports show that Bolden is moving normally and there seems to be no long-lasting injury. And that's all that matters. At the end of the day, regardless of anything, we all wish for these brave players to be healthy.