Ike Taylor’s Pittsburgh Steelers somewhat infamously helped usher in a new era of player safety rules over a decade ago. Thanks to teammates like James Harrison in particular, the NFL began cracking down on certain types of hits. We suddenly learned an awful lot about what you can and cannot do to “defenseless receivers”.
Those Steelers teams adjusted, however, even if not in the manner the NFL wanted entirely. And Taylor is confident that today’s players are going to adjust to the new hip-drop tackle rule as well. But perhaps not without unintended consequences, he seems to suggest.