Ben Roethlisberger suffered what looked like a very serious injury on Sunday against the Baltimore Ravens. After he took off running deep in his own territory in an attempt to gain a first down, a combined hit from Matt Judon and Za'Darius Smith appeared to knock him out of the game with a shoulder injury. Roethlisberger recounted the experience on his radio show on 93.7 The Fan.

“You feel a very big person coming down on top of you and when you hit the ground, instantly you just kind of feel pain, you feel shortness of breath, you feel a little bit of everything, I’ll be honest, but pain mostly. Then as I’m lying there…I had to stay in the fetal position because I couldn’t even straighten my legs because I couldn’t breathe. You just hear the doctors and you hear everybody ‘What’s going on? What’s going on?’ And you want to answer them but you really can’t.”

Fortunately, Roethlisberger was just fine upon examination. He just had the wind knocked out of him. Josh Dobbs came in and threw a 22-yard pass to JuJu Smith-Schuster, and then Roethlisberger reentered the fray. He did reveal how he felt during that examination, though, and it is something to watch moving forward.

“Okay, shoulder…a little sore, but I think it’s okay. Collarbone…feels okay, [and] then goes the whole checklist thing. Once I got on the sideline more, your wind starts coming back to you.”

The Steelers have a very quick turnaround this week. They play on Thursday Night Football, so that shoulder soreness Roethlisberger felt is likely still problematic. He is also still dealing with a fractured finger on his left hand. It's not as if minor injuries are new to Roethlisberger. He has been playing through pain for his entire career. But with only three days of rest and the fearsome Carolina Panthers defensive line ready to attack him, such conditions are hardly ideal.

Fortunately, if the Steelers can sneak through the Panthers game, they'll have a mini bye week in which their injured players can recover. That is the advantage of Thursday Night Football, and thanks to their tiebreaker over the Cincinnati Bengals and the home-field advantage they have in Week 17's matchup, the have a bit of leeway to work with when it comes to their record.

If Dobbs needs to start a game at some point just to get Roethlisberger back to full strength, that is an outcome that the Steelers can live with. It may have only been one throw, but Dobbs looked like an NFL quarterback on Sunday, just as he did throughout the preseason. The Steelers have always done a good job of managing Roethlisberger's health and keeping him out of regular season games so he can be prepared for the postseason. It hasn't come to that yet, but it might soon with these minor injuries racking up.