Kelechi Osemele feared the worst.
The rookie right tackle was carted off the field in the first half of Sunday's game after a pile of players fell onto his right ankle, bending his leg the wrong way and bringing him to the turf in noticeable pain. Trainers put an air cast on his ankle and took him to the locker room.
Amazingly, his X-rays turned up negative.
A quarter later, he was back on the field at right tackle.
"I thought the worst, and I was worried when they put the cast on me," said Osemele, who is a Houston native and had friends and family in attendance. "But after a while I was good."
Osemele described the ankle injury as "real minor" and with a bye next weekend, he doesn't expect to miss any game time.
"I just want to rehab it on this bye week and get it as strong as possible," Osemele said. "I'll be good regardless."
Head Coach John Harbaugh was impressed that Osemele was able to return.
"He had an ankle sprain and I thought he did a great job," Harbaugh said. "He's a tough guy. K.O. has a big heart. He's down here in Houston and it seemed like he played pretty well, even with the ankle."
Osemele wasn't the only Raven to go down with an injury Sunday, as safety Ed Reed was tended to by trainers in the fourth quarter with a rib contusion. He went down to the turf after making a tackle, and eventually returned to the game.
Reed, who also said that he's playing through a torn labrurm in his shoulder, is not concerned about the chest injury lingering into the next game.
"I'll be fine," Reed said. "We're off this week and I'm sure I'll have a lot of time to recover and relax, see my doctor, see my son and get away from football."
The other significant injury was to defensive tackle Haloti Ngata, who entered the game with a knee injury that limited his practice time during the week. He was noticeably gimpy at points throughout the game, but was still able to finish.
"Haloti gutted it out," Harbaugh said. "Time off is going to help obviously. It's going to help him heal up a little bit."
Starting nose tackle Ma'ake Kemoeatu didn't play Sunday after being limited in practice all week because of a knee injury.
"It just didn't look right," Harbaugh said. "He fought through it all week, but he wasn't moving as well as we like for him to."
