It did not matter if you were 8 or 80, from Bakersfield or Buffalo when Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed to the Paycor Stadium turf in Cincinnati while suffering cardiac arrest during Monday Night Football.
Fear took over. Empathy took over. Raw and basic humanity took over.
Football mattered nil. Everyone seemed to get that as medical personnel administered CPR for a reported nine minutes as tear-stained teammates and opponents circled around Hamlin. Did you see Josh Allen? Did you see Stefon Diggs?
Did the NFL understand, though? If the league did as those terrifying moments unfolded, did they show it — resolutely and without hesitation?
As a 24-year-old man fought for his life while the country held its collective breath, as mothers thought about sons, as sisters thought about brothers, as friends thought about those closest to them, the prospect of continuing the game seemed unfathomable.
Then came ESPN's reporting, multiple times, that play could resume after a 5-minute warmup. Video showed Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, after earlier comforting Allen and other Bills players, making throws.
It seemed the height of NFL insensitivity and cluelessness.
Troy Vincent, the NFL's executive vice president of football operations, flatly denied the league ever considered playing as Hamlin's life-or-death fight shifted to the intensive care unit of University of Cincinnati Medical Center.
"I'm not sure where that came from," Vincent told reporters in a late-night conference call. "… It never crossed our mind to talk about warming up to resume play. That's ridiculous. That's insensitive. And that's not a place that we should ever be in."
On that, all can agree.
So, if the NFL truly never considered it — and believability can be debated, given the ESPN reports, Burrow seemingly shifting back to game mode and more — was the first instinct to do the right thing?
How could anyone on the field, grown men and sports gladiators clearly shattered to their cores, possibly regain the level of composure and focus a contact-based game like football requires? Who else could that put at injury risk? The mental ramifications?
If the NFL is shooting straight about what was and was not being debated behind the scenes, it's almost impossible to defend the time it took to postpone the game.
If the grave situation was unclear as ESPN color analyst Troy Aikman described the chest compressions as continuing "feverishly," there are no words. As reporter Lisa Salters showed uncommon grace while fighting tears on the sideline? As players leveraged social media to plead for the game to end?
Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray: "Prayers up for Damar Hamlin and his family. This game should've been called, nobody is concerned about football right now."
Former Chargers running back Jacob Hester: "Nobody gives a damn about football right now. Call the game. The health of Damar Hamlin is the only thing that matters. You can figure out the logistics later, not now."
Broncos offensive lineman Calvin Anderson: "Considering the magnitude of what could be happening to one of our NFL brothers on that field, I hope this game is postponed. We are Humans first."
There were more. A lot more. It seemed clear to all those people before the ones in charge of safeguarding those in the game.
The Bills were an understandable wreck. Imagine, too, being Tee Higgins, the Bengals receiver tackled by Hamlin immediately before he crumpled. Was it not obvious that he could not, should not, be asked to continue playing?
Again, it felt like everyone other than the NFL — those watching it, those covering it, those who've played it — knew only one decision should be considered. As the game remained in purgatory as suspended, rather than postponed or canceled, it became more and more incomprehensible.
The NFL can say it needed to talk with the teams, juggle logistics and do a range of things behind the scenes. It never should have been that complicated. It did not have to be that complicated.
Questions will rightfully linger.
If ESPN's reporting about a quick warmup were incorrect, why didn't the NFL contact them as they repeated it multiple times? Why in the world would ESPN make that up or act that recklessly? Given the level of care and restraint the network demonstrated throughout, it strained plausibility. Neither lead voice Joe Buck nor ESPN backed down from its reporting early Tuesday.
You decide.
What I know: I wrote many times about former Chargers running back Paul Lowe's abhorrent wait for concussion-settlement money after he lost a daughter to cancer and grandchildren to a fire, while fighting his own significant health hurdles. He was in no way alone.
It was infuriating.
In the most important moments, the NFL has not dependably proved it cares for its players more than protecting profits or keeping the television train on the tracks. Concussion protocols. Domestic-violence policies. Misbehaving, miscreant owners. Decision-making motivations abound.
The league, whether telling us the truth or not about the Hamlin situation, has not earned the benefit of the doubt.
