Strolling around the Superdome on Monday, Vikings quarterback Gus Frerotte ran into Emmitt Smith, the NFL's all-time leading rusher and now a TV analyst. They talked about the previous Monday night, when Pittsburgh and Baltimore bludgeoned each other in a brutal display of felononious-assault football and Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis broke Rashard Mendenhall's shoulder with a head-on tackle.
"He was saying, 'I can't believe the hitting that's going on,'" Frerotte said. "He said, 'It's just amazing, I can't believe I actually played in this game, and how violent and ferocious and how fast these guys run, and how people just throw their bodies.'"
Then Frerotte played in a game every bit as violent. During the Vikings' 30-27 victory over New Orleans on Monday, there were a half-dozen hits on which a defender or blocker left his feet, turning his body into a missile that caused the receiver of the blow to fly through the air himself.
This is the modern NFL — a new breed of players moving with more speed and ferocity than ever, wrote columnist Jim Souhan of the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
Frerotte took one hit that forced him to leave the game to "evaluate" himself, and his willingness to play when team trainers were trying to examine him further might have won the game, and won over his locker room.
Before Frerotte started taking shots to the head and sternum, Vikings linebacker Erin Henderson got blindsided by a block while chasing Reggie Bush on a punt return. Henderson's feet flipped high in the air and he landed on his back. Then he got up and chased futilely after Bush. This week, Henderson has spent a lot of time in the team's training room.
On another play, Saints tight end Billy Miller caught a short pass and sprinted downfield. Vikings cornerback Cedric Griffin vectored over from the sideline, launched himself, and flattened Miller, who remained prone for minutes while Griffin paced, worried, 20 yards away.
