49ers punt returner Kyle Williams had a pretty rough day Sunday. His overtime fumble basically handed the NFC Championship to the Giants and ended the Niners season. However, it sounds like Williams' day was destined to be bad before it even started.
Knowing that Williams has had four concussions, several Giants players admitted afterward that they targeted him during the game with the intention of laying a big hit.
From Benjamin Wallace-Wells of New York Magazine:
After the game, reporters crowded around the locker of Jacquian Williams, who'd forced the second fumble, hoping for an angle: Had the Giants noticed something about Kyle Williams's technique, some weakness in the 49ers punt-return scheme? "Nah," Williams said. "The thing is, we knew he had four concussions, so that was our biggest thing, was to take him outta the game."
Devin Thomas, the reserve wide receiver who recovered both of Kyle Williams's fumbles, was even more explicit. "He's had a lot of concussions," Thomas told the Star-Ledger columnist Steve Politi. "We were just like, ‘We gotta put a hit on that guy.' ... [Giants reserve safety Tyler] Sash did a great job hitting him early and he looked kind of dazed when he got up. I feel like that made a difference and he coughed it up."
While it might sound barbaric, we are talking about football, after all. It's nothing new for defenders to recognize past injuries in their opponents and exploit them. If anything, it's something for the NFL brass and team execs to look at and know how important it is for them to protect their players who have suffered concussions.