In Week 15 against the Buffalo Bills, Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown set career-highs with 14 receptions and 193 yards with a 66-yard touchdown. There were no signs he was compromised at all, up to and including playing 72 of the Lions' 79 offensive snaps (91 percent) so what he revealed on this week's episode of the "St. Brown Podcast" was surprising.
“I had some s**t, bro. You know I’ve never thrown up in my life, ever? You know that, right? This is the first time I’ve ever thrown up," St. Brown said. "Listen, Saturday night is the first time I’ve thrown up in my life. ... Throwing up just sounds crazy. I’m sitting there, like ‘F**k. I feel like s**t, I’ve got to do it.’ So I put my finger down my throat, a little bit comes out, I’m like, ‘Damn.’ Two seconds later, the whole s**t just woosh. Like everything I ate just came out. I felt a lot better after."
“I had no appetite. I barely ate Saturday. Sunday I didn’t eat. I had like two or three bananas. I had an I.V., so obviously I had enough liquid and stuff," St. Brown explained. "But after like three plays, I would be dead, so tired. And we were doing two-minute (offense) all game. We were all coming back to the huddle every play, hands on our hips, breathing like, ‘F**k, bro.’ We kept scoring though.”
Food poising was not going to keep Amon-Ra St. Brown from playing
On Wednesday, Lions head coach Dan Campbell said he did not know St. Brown was ill until after the game. Wide receivers coach Antwaan Randle El said the same, but Randle El said he wondered why St. Brown was "tired and sucking wind" during the game.
Based on history, a bout of food poisoning the day before was not going to keep St. Brown from playing against the Bills.
Late before the Week 8 game against the Las Vegas Raiders last season, St. Brown popped up on the injury report with an illness. He played and produced like normal (six catches for 108 yards), but afterward he detailed how he was dealing with hand, foot and mouth disease. He later revealed, on the Netflix show "Receiver", that he played a game with a left oblique muscle that was torn "completely off the bone" a few weeks before he contracted hand, foot and mouth disease.
Tired and on pretty much an empty stomach is low on the totem pole of things St. Brown has played through, and what he was able to do in spite of it was not surprising.