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GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Randall Cobb can't say for certain, but the Green Bay Packers wide receiver can't help but wonder if being miked up for the team's NFC divisional playoff loss to the Arizona Cardinals contributed to the lung injury he suffered during the first quarter -- an injury that left him coughing up blood and landed him in a Phoenix-area hospital overnight. Cobb, who was making the rounds Wednesday at Super Bowl 50's Radio Row, told "The Jim Rome Show" that he was wearing a microphone battery pack underneath his left shoulder pad, and that's what he landed on as he dove backward to make a circus catch late in the first quarter. In his interview, Cobb said he "punctured" his lung; previously, the injury had been reported as a "bruised" lung.  "I made the catch. I got up and I felt fine, and I was walking back to the huddle, and I noticed that it started to get harder for me to breathe," Cobb told Rome. "And then it felt like I was going to throw up; it felt like I was choking on something.
"So I went to throw up, and I started spitting up blood, and it was kind of a crazy moment. And then I went back and got a chest X-ray. I didn't break a rib, I didn't fracture a rib, which is really abnormal, to puncture a lung without that. But I was miked up for the game, and the battery for the mic was on my shoulder pads. I landed flush on my back during the catch, and I punctured my lung. "I'm not saying it was [because of being miked up]. There's no way to prove that. But it's kind of crazy that I punctured a lung without breaking a rib." Cobb's 49-yard catch, which would have given the Packers a first down at the Arizona 3-yard line, was wiped out by an illegal shift penalty on right tackle Bryan Bulaga. Without Cobb, the Packers were forced to play the rest of the game without their top four receivers from the start of training camp. The Packers were already without Jordy Nelson, whom they lost to a torn ACL in his right knee in preseason; No. 4 receiver Ty Montgomery, who was on injured reserve with an early-season ankle injury that required surgery; and Davante Adams, who was inactive with a knee injury suffered the previous week. Asked how scary the ordeal was, Cobb replied, "It's more scary now, looking back on what could have happened, because I'm very fortunate my lung didn't collapse. If my lung had collapsed, it would have been pretty scary. I would have had emergency surgery to put a tube into my lung to help me breathe, but luckily I was all right." Cobb stayed in the hospital overnight and flew home the next day, after the team departed without him. "I think it wasn't until I got to the hospital that I realized how serious it was," Cobb said. "I just thought I couldn't catch my breath. Once we got the scan [at the stadium], I was like, 'OK, I didn't break or fracture a rib, I should be fine. Can I go back in the game?' And they were like, 'Are you crazy? You're spitting up blood.' "And I'm like, 'It's the playoffs, you know what I mean? Nothing's broken, let me go.' So they monitored me for like, 20, 30 minutes [in the locker room], and then they were like, 'We have to go to the hospital.' So I got to the hospital right before halftime and watched the rest of the game from a hospital bed."
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