They feared Dennis Byrd never would walk again, his life paralyzed the way it was by as frightening a football collision as you ever will see one fateful afternoon at Giants Stadium.
I wish I never had seen it, but I was in the press box that day, Nov. 29, 1992, suddenly no longer covering a football game, but a race to keep a young man in the prime of his life alive, players from his Jets and the Kansas City Chiefs praying all around him as he lay there paralyzed and motionless.
Those who rush the passer talk about wanting to meet at the quarterback, and horrifically, Dennis Byrd met a teammate named Scott Mersereau instead of quarterback Dave Krieg, his head and neck crashing into Mersereau’s chest.