The One-Step Outrage : Open Season on NFL Quarterbacks for Those Who Race In and Take a Step Before Unloading

Whenever football fans tune in the pros this year, the defenses are out there showing off the NFL’s new morality:

It is open season on quarterbacks.

Defensive players seem to have lost interest in merely rushing the passer. They’re apparently out to hurt him now. They’re using the most lethal force available to them, their helmets, to knock him down.

One quarterback after another, from Troy Aikman to Chris Miller, has fallen with a concussion. And some quarterbacks, Jeff Hostetler and Aikman among them, have gone down and out when opponents went for their knees.

Why is this happening?

Could it be a football manifestation of the hatred and viciousness in contemporary America, where murder is common, where physical abuse is the norm, and where hatred is built into everything from popular music to national politics?

Or could it be that the brutality grows out of an NFL rule that authorizes pass rushers to take one full step after the ball is gone before crashing into the quarterback?

That rule is an outrage. It has legalized gratuitous violence. And it has accustomed a nation of football fans and players to brutal hits on players long out of the play.

A sprinting linebacker races in now from seven to 10 yards away, takes one last giant stride, ducks, closes his eyes, and, using the crown of his helmet, knocks the passer silly when he’s in a helpless position--physically unable to defend himself--after just throwing the ball.

There’s a name for that in football, spearing. There’s another name for it in the law books, assault with a deadly weapon.

What’s to be done about it? The NFL’s leaders should, first, abolish the one-step rule.

Then they should make it an NFL crime to hit any player who is out of the play--as a passer is after the ball is gone, and as a receiver is when the ball is plainly under-thrown or overthrown.

A defensive player who ignores the ball and sneaks in unawares, smashing a defenseless opponent, is not playing a game. He is attacking a helpless human being. He should be ejected and fined--and suspended.

MAN OR VEGETABLE?

To most sports fans, the game’s violence is an attractive aspect of pro football.

In such a game, can the NFL penalize players for violence?

It already does.

The NFL rid itself of sideline violence by enforcing 15-yard penalties for hits on out-of-bounds players--even if they’re one inch out of bounds, and even if the hit is involuntary and feather-soft.

What’s needed now is the same kind of protection for quarterbacks and receivers who are out of the play.

The NFL once got by without such nit-picking enforcement. In the days when the Rams had the most feared front four in football--the so-called Fearsome Foursome--their Hall of Famers never picked on defenseless passers.

If the ball had been thrown, they slowed down--eased up.

Nor did the NFL’s fiercest defensive players ever go for Joe Namath’s bad knees--although hits like Aikman has endured this fall would have ended that Hall of Famer’s career well before it got rolling.

Are there other reasons for the injury problem?

Yes. For one thing, 1990s players are bigger and faster. Although steroid use seems to be down, some have apparently found other performance-enhancing drugs.

But none of that has much to do with the main issue--the head-to-head hitting that is scrambling the brains of the quarterbacks. A wiry 175-pounder in an NFL helmet can do that. The thing that’s wrong now is the attitude of the players.

What if the rules aren’t changed?

Pro football will lose some of its most valuable players. A concussion is a critical--if often underrated--injury with a cumulative effect that can turn a human into a vegetable.

At 28, Aikman, cognizant of the peril, and having already made millions, has taken care of his money. Why shouldn’t he now retire and take care of his health? Some of his advisers are urging just that.

To the league, the departure of such players would be an irreparable loss.

“There are 28 pro clubs but only about eight good quarterbacks,” Hall of Fame coach Sid Gillman said. “The teams have dozens of good players for other positions, but the supply of even adequate quarterbacks is the smallest in sports.”

The irony is that no other players, in any sport, have to take the abuse that quarterbacks routinely get--few as they are.

Even so, none of them, not even Aikman, will blow the whistle. They fear a cry-baby label. They fear vengeance.

BAN THE HEADHUNTERS

As an NFL concept, it should be illegal to hit to harm, or to hit a player who is out of the play.

What new rules would help?

The package should include these:

* Much stricter enforcement for hitting with the crown of the helmet.

* Heavy fines and suspensions for hitting head to head--the most dangerous act in the game.

* A specific injunction against hitting passers in the knees.

In particular, NFL rules should outlaw hits below mid-thigh when the quarterback is standing or running laterally behind the line, or setting to throw or throwing. Defensive men who have been blocked or who are falling should be required to make every effort not to roll or scramble into the passer’s legs. They must instead get up and hit him above mid-thigh.

* Pass rushers must be making every effort to ease up if they unavoidably run into a quarterback who has thrown the ball. It has to be the defensive man’s responsibility to know if the ball is gone.

* Pass-defense players must be making every effort to ease up if they unavoidably run into a receiver who has dropped the ball or can’t reach it.

In every case, the burden of proof has to be on the defense.

Football properly played is, and should be, fierce but not brutal, violent but not life-threatening.

These should be the penalties:

* For hitting head to head or hitting a quarterback in the knees, 15 yards and automatic ejection, followed by a fine equal to a game’s salary, or a suspension for one or two games, without pay.

* If the referee misses the call, the league should automatically fine the player a game’s salary or suspend him for a game or two, without pay.

That would get the attention of the coaches who once punished their players for brutality but who now encourage it.

To assure that most quarterbacks live to fight another year, the NFL’s club owners should make these changes before next month’s playoffs. They aren’t typical rule changes. Whereas the thrust of most new rules is to enliven the game, these are necessary to health and life.

‘YOU’VE GOT TO PULL UP’

Some wonder whether it’s realistic to ask defensive players to slow down before hitting a quarterback who has already thrown the ball.

Is it?

A radio analyst for the Rams is here to tell you that it is.

He is former Fearsome Foursome defensive end Deacon Jones, who, as a quarterback hunter in the 1960s, was so effective that he coined a word for what he did--the sack.

If, however, the passer could get the ball away--no matter how close Jones--the collision was invariably less than violent. He invariably eased up.

“You’ve got to pull up,” Jones said. “There’s always time enough to make that decision. I don’t want to see them take the toughness out of the game--but there’s no pride in hitting a man when the ball is out (of his hands).”

Distinguishing between hits would be a judgment call for the officials, but what they do is make judgment calls--judging, for example, whether a quarterback, when sprinting into the sideline, is an inch in or out when nudged.

It’s far more dangerous in the pocket these days.

And one unforgivable aspect of all the brutality is that it’s coarsening the players, as well as the officials and the league.

And a coarsening nation seems to love it all. The huge TV ratings for pro football are still going up. But does nothing else matter? Why must the NFL live down to the country’s new low standards? Why not try to bring back some human dignity?