Did Super Bowl MVP Terrell Davis suffer a migraine or concussion? He isn't sure

More recently, there has been the protracted legal wrangling over the red tape which, as of mid-November and according to the New York Times, had seen the NFL pay out a little over half of the first $195 million owed toward the 140 approved claims — 10 percent of the total claims filed.

The rest were still being vetted, amended or contested.

As the gears of justice slowly grind, too late for many of those most debilitated by the violence of professional football, you probably won't hear much about that league-wide issue during the NBC telecast of Super Bowl LII. Then again, the New England Patriots — whose star tight end Rob Gronkowski has been cleared to play after suffering a concussion in the AFC championship game — are no strangers to concussion-related controversy, especially on the game's biggest stage.

Here's a look at a few of the most notable times when concussion and glory intersected at the Super Bowl:

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Both the victorious Denver Broncos and the Carolina Panthers lost key players to concussion during Peyton Manning's sloppily played coronation.

Midway through the third quarter, Panthers receiver Corey "Philly" Brown whacked the back of his helmet against the ground after outleaping two Broncos defensive backs for a 42-yard completion from Cam Newton. Brown staggered a bit as he popped off the ground and was diagnosed with a concussion upon reaching the sideline.

Also in the third quarter, Broncos linebacker Shaquil Barrett was concussed on a blindside hit and did not return.

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Patriots receiver Julian Edelman took a helmet-to-helmet hit from Seattle Seahawks safety Kam Chancellor with 10:58 remaining in the fourth quarter. That's when the intrigue started.

Though an Associated Press report said Edelman "appeared disoriented" after the play and "seemed to have difficulty getting up" after an incomplete pass several plays later, the valuable possession receiver remained in the game. Edelman had two more catches for 30 yards and finished with a team-leading 109 receiving yards on nine receptions.

Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels allowed after his team's 28-24 victory that Edelman had taken a "big hit" on the play, but coach Bill Belichick pled ignorance on whether Edelman had been tested for concussion.

"We're not allowed to speak about injuries right now," Edelman said repeatedly after the game.

This past November, nearly three full years after that game, Edelman told the "Pardon My Take" podcast that it was a hip injury — not a concussion — that caused him to move erratically after the Chancellor hit.

"We went through all the protocols and all of that, and I was fine, bro," he said. "If you see a guy get dinged up, like a real (concussion), you see hands — like, you can't control stuff. That hits the reset button. I was still able to function after that."

Edelman, who missed this season with a torn ACL, said he took a helmet off the hip on a punt return earlier in the fourth quarter.

"Everyone thinks I'm, like, dying and I can't get up," he said. "I couldn't move my hip. And then, in the next couple of plays, a guy hits my hip again. When you get a hip pointer, bro, you can't move anything. I was battling that."

Midway through the third quarter of that same game, Seahawks defensive end Cliff Avril suffered a concussion during Bobby Wagner's interception return. Avril was quickly diagnosed on the Seahawks sideline by team physicians and neurologist Javier Cardenas, a member of the NFL's Head, Neck and Spine Committee and director of the Barrow Concussion and Brain Injury Center in Phoenix.

He sat in the Seahawks locker room listening to the roaring crowd as the Patriots rallied with two late touchdowns and held on with a goal-line interception in the final seconds.

'Of course, I wish I could have played out there," Avril told the Tacoma News Tribune in November 2016. "But my health is more important. I was out of it, so they made the right call. That's not something you want to play with."

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The headline in the next day's New York Times read, "Even a Migraine Doesn't Slow Down (Terrell) Davis on His Way to the M.V.P."

Was it actually an undiagnosed concussion? Two decades later, it's impossible to say for sure.

"Listen, I don't know if it was or not because there was no protocol then," Davis told the Pioneer Press this week. "I don't know if I would have passed it or not. It was fortunate but unfortunate. Fortunate that I was able to play because I was able to help the team win but kind of unfortunate that something like that went without being medically cleared."

A San Diego product and Pro Football Hall of Famer, the Denver Broncos running back made the most of his homecoming in a 31-24 upset of the Green Bay Packers. But first, he had to shake off a migraine that initially had left him ruled out for the second half.

"It almost never happened for me," he told reporters after the game. "In the second quarter, I really couldn't see straight. I had gotten dinged a little, and I knew a migraine was coming on."

Davis, who lost a fumble on his first carry of the second half, rebounded to finish with 157 yards and a Super Bowl-record three rushing touchdowns on 30 carries. After the game he said the whole experience was "like a dream," adding that he felt "kind of numb."

Two decades later, his greatest game remains shrouded in some mystery.

"I think it was more the migraine," he said. "If it was a concussion, it wasn't like I had memory issues or anything like that."

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Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly doesn't remember much about the final quarter of the only other Super Bowl played in the Twin Cities.

"I had no clue where I was," the former Buffalo Bills star said in April 2016.

That August, in a separate interview, he admitted he was so disoriented after that 37-24 loss to the Washington Redskins, he went to the wrong hotel after the game.

Kelly, sacked five times in the loss, believes he suffered an undiagnosed concussion while being sacked on the first play from scrimmage in the fourth quarter. He came out for one play on the following series, giving way to backup Todd Collins, but returned to throw for a pair of meaningless scores.

Those would be the only touchdown passes Kelly managed (against seven interceptions) in four consecutive Super Bowl losses.

"Maybe I should have got hit upside the head earlier in the game," Kelly said in August 2016. "I probably would have played better."

Kelly, a cancer survivor, confirmed the concussion story again this week during an appearance on WCCO-TV.

"The good memory is making it here," he said. "The bad memory is the Washington Redskins pretty much put it to us. We got beat pretty bad, and I sustained a concussion, which wasn't good."

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Clinging to a five-point lead with 3 1/2 minutes to play, Terry Bradshaw connected with Lynn Swann on a 64-yard touchdown pass. The tradeoff was significant.

Stepping up in the pocket to avoid a blitzing D.D. Lewis before getting leveled by Cliff Harris, Bradshaw never saw what happened after the ball left his hand. Instead, he had to be helped off the field and spent the night in a Miami hospital following a concussion that sent him to the locker room with two minutes to play.

Backup Terry Hanratty finished up with a few handoffs to Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier, and the Steelers held on for the 21-17 win over the Dallas Cowboys.

"I didn't know it was a touchdown until I came into the locker room," Bradshaw told reporters after the game. "I'm still hazy. ... I don't know how I got the ball off. I was hearing bells or something on the ground."

The Washington Post called it a "slight concussion" and suggested "his headache certainly will be worth the price" due to the winner's share of $15,000 per player.

Ironically, it was Swann who entered the game questionable after the Oakland Raiders left him concussed the week before in the AFC championship.

"I did not think I was going to be able to play," Swann said, "and the doctors essentially left it up to me."

Four catches for 161 yards and a touchdown later, Swann was named Super Bowl MVP after repeatedly torching Cowboys cornerback Mark Washington. Bradshaw would go on to win back-to-back Super Bowl MVPs at the end of the decade.

Dan Jenkins, writing the Sports Illustrated story on Super Bowl X, lauded the "indomitable Terry Bradshaw, who seems to collect concussions and championship rings with equal facility."

In 2011, Bradshaw went public for the first time with details of his short-term memory loss related to the numerous concussions he suffered as a player.

"When I played for the Steelers and I got my bell run, I'd take smelling salts and go right back out there," he said. "All of us did that. We didn't know any better. You don't know how many times I was in the huddle, asking my teammates to help me call a play."

Bradshaw, now 69 and still doing studio commentary for Fox Sports, said in 2011 he had stopped citing statistics and certain players' names on the air.

"I couldn't remember them exactly," Bradshaw said, "and I didn't want to make a mistake. I'm on national TV in front of millions and I hate making mistakes."

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The Green Bay Packers were putting the finishing touches on a 35-10 victory in the inaugural meeting between the champions of the NFL and the AFL when loquacious Kansas City Chiefs cornerback Fred "The Hammer" Williamson knocked himself out on an attempted tackle of Donny Anderson.

Williamson, who took an Anderson knee to the helmet, was carried off the field on a stretcher, much to the delight of those on the Packers sideline.

"The Hammer said that he had a blow delivered parallel to the earth's surface with such great velocity that he had personally been responsible for cracking 15 helmets in the NFL," Packers Hall of Fame guard Jerry Kramer would tell NFL Network. "So we decided that if The Hammer put the hammer on one of our players, that we were going to put the hammer on him. Well, The Hammer knocked himself out. Everybody was wondering, who got The Hammer?"

Williamson, 80, went on to a long career in Hollywood as an actor and producer.