When Case Keenum's head bounced off the turf late in the Rams' game against the Ravens a few weeks ago, it was clear that he was, at the very least, woozy. Whether he had suffered a concussion would be determined by the Rams' medical staff, which didn't happen until after the game.

Given the seriousness with which head injuries are now treated, the backlash was as swift as it was inevitable, from the trainers to the NFL spotter who didn't think to stop the game after a) Keenum went down and b) struggled to get up.

At the time, Rams coach Jeff Fisher explained that he didn't know Keenum was hurt.

"I didn't see anything from my vantage point on the sideline as far as Case's slow recovery," Fisher said. "The shot that you see where he got up slow that we've seen out there, I didn't see that. I was in the game management mode at that point, less than a minute left. That's where I was."

The league concluded that the Rams wouldn't be punished but teams could face discipline for future infractions. That doesn't sit well with NFLPA President Eric Winston, a former player. On Tuesday, Winston said that the NFL should fine the Rams for failing to properly handle Keenum's head injury.

Case Keenum was obviously hurt but remained in the game. (USATSI)
Case Keenum was obviously hurt but remained in the game. (USATSI)

“Complete failure to adhere to the protocol,” Winston told USAToday.com. “Show me someone that says, 'No, the Rams did exactly the right thing.' They didn't. Everybody knows they didn't. So, there has to be discipline then, right? Because when a player doesn't do something that he's supposed to do, he gets fined for that when it comes to health and safety.”

Winston's point: if the NFL doesn't give players a mulligan for on-field transgressions, why are teams suddenly getting a pass?

“There was no grace period for players,” Winston continued. “It was, ‘Immediately change, or you're going to be fined.’ All of a sudden, stuff that was legal isn't legal. And we understand why. There wasn't a fight against it. But all of a sudden that became not only illegal, but fined immediately. While these protocols have now been around for years, (teams are) still not being fined.”

Meanwhile, ESPN NFL analyst and former player Mark Schlereth thinks Fisher wasn't close to telling the truth about the reasons why he left Keenum in the game against the Ravens.

“For Jeff Fisher to say ‘Hey, I was in game-management mode,’ that’s an absolute bold-face lie,” Schlereth said Wednesday during an appearance on CBS Sports Radio's 920 in St. Louis. “It’s ludicrous.”

Schlereth continued: “I thought it was a systemic failure throughout the whole organization when it comes to the handling of Case Keenum. You essentially put a player’s life in danger. The thing that I was really upset about and really angry about is that the NFL didn’t do anything about it. I went through all the fines that have been levied out . . . almost a million dollars on the season so far tallied up for football players playing football and yet here we have a kid who was knocked unconscious. And all the things that we’ve put in place to protect our players, every one of them failed.”