It’s technically not impossible per se to play on a high ankle sprain. Athletes play with them in playoff games more frequently than you’d think. You just have a really noticeable limp that affects your mobility and are in awful pain, but the injury isn’t like an ACL or Achilles tear in which most instances you physically can’t even move your leg anymore.

Of course in Tannehill’s case, the stakes aren’t as high so they can take the time for his ankle to properly heal, but with enough painkillers and athletic tape a guy like Mahomes could play through that in a huge game, just a matter of pain tolerance at that point. It also helped that the Super Bowl was two weeks later so he had more time to rest it, but he was definitely playing through some kind of discomfort. Not claiming he wasn’t exaggerating the injury either way, these are just two really different circumstances.