Injuries to Watt, Beckham top headlines

With pro football all ready in a precarious position regarding health and safety, the injuries are unsettling.

— some predict the issue of head trauma and its long-term effects will doom the game — seeing the league’s most dynamic defender and receiver go down hours apart is unsettling.

Add in Beckham’s Giants losing three other wideouts; Watt’s Texans seeing another key defensive player sidelined; Green Bay’s most clutch receiver and one of Baltimore’s leading scorers not finishing games. OUCH! At the end of New York’s fifth straight defeat to begin the season, there were three tight ends on the field. Beckham had a broken left ankle. Brandon Marshall and Sterling Sheppard already had sprained left ankles, and kick returner/receiver Dwayne Harris broke a foot.

“I realized that Dwayne went down, Shep went down, Brandon went down, Odell went down,” offensive lineman Justin Pugh said. “It’s crazy.”

Perhaps. What it needs to not be is commonplace. Giants fans already have lost faith and much of their interest because of a winless start. Pugh and his fellow blockers can’t protect Eli Manning very well, and nowManning has no idea who he will be throwing to next week at Denver, or beyond that.

Also threatened is the artistry of games— OK, there hasn’t been much of that for Big Blue this season. That artistry suffers, of course, when the best perform-

AP PHOTO/BILL KOSTROUN Trainers take a look at New York Giants wide receiver Brandon Marshall after he went down making a catch during the first half of an NFL football game against the Los Angeles Chargers, Sunday, Oct. 8, 2017, in East Rutherford, N.J.