Sportsmanship or lack thereof

[StL FinFan]

Has it gotten so bad that players are lauded as heroes for helping an injured opposing player off the field?

[MaineDolFan]

I remember this clear as day:

1992, Miami is in Los Angeles to play the Raiders.  Marino fades into the pocket and a defensive end, I forget his name, gets Marino's legs wrapped and he can't move.  This is long before the 'in the grasp' rule.  Raiders safety Ronnie Lott has Marino locked in and it's not going to be pretty, Danny ain't going nowhere.

Chester McGlockton sees what is about to happen and he steps in front of Marino to Lott doesn't have a shot, he reaches behind him, grabs Marino's jersey and eases him to the ground.

It was a very classy play of a guy that saw the other thing that could come of that play with Marino getting hurt. 

This happened all the time in the NFL, I remember Dan Fouts was the recipient of a couple charity 'ease shoves' to keep him from getting knocked into next year.

My point is that unless you were watching this game you didn't hear much about it and never will.  If that happened today, say with Warren Sapp protecting Manning, it would be on a loop on every news channel for half a year.

[BigDaddyFin]

In football I think you see it less because they have more rules to protect the quarterback.  I think that it's gotten somewhat out of control and the rule about roughing the passer has gotten so ambiguous that crews don't ref it consistantly from game to game.

The game which you mention came before the "Joe Montana Rule," before intentional grounding outside of the pocket became legal, and before they decided that you couldn't hit the quarterback in the head.  If I remember correctly, defensive players still got two steps on the quarterback at the time.  Now it's one.

[Phishfan]

To this day I refuse to wish my opponent good luck before a game and will typically pull on jerseys, shorts, etc. to gain an advantage. I would never purposely play to hurt anyone though and hate players who do. Injuries are the worst part of sport.