How the NFL Cheats: Under the Pile

Whether you call it breaking the rules, bending the rules or just getting creative with the rules, cheating has always been a part of the NFL and always will be. This is Part 3 in a Bleacher Report series on how NFL players and teams seek out some advantage, any advantage, over their competition. Part 1 was on the use of foreign substances, Part 2 on gaining an extra advantage at home.

Panthers quarterback Cam Newton made what historically has been known in the NFL as a “business decision” in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl 50. There was a loose ball up for grabs, and rather than dive on it, he took a step back.

Cam really is Superman. And that football was kryptonite. https://t.co/YgT6geKDA7

— Aaron Nagler (@AaronNagler) February 8, 2016

Had Newton gone for the football, he knows what would have happened.

He would have almost certainly found himself on the bottom of a massive pile.

And though he had to know he would likely get killed for making a “business decision” during the Super Bowl, Newton also knows what happens on the bottom of piles.

Cam made a business decision … At the super bowl?

— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) February 8, 2016

Odd time for Cam Newton to make a business decision.

— Adam Kilgore (@AdamKilgoreWP) February 8, 2016

What goes on where the eye cannot see sometimes can be vile, inhumane and unspeakable. There is a lot of what referee Ben Dreith famously referred to as “giving him the business.”

And sometimes “the business” gets to the most sensitive of areas. 

During a game in the 1980s, Hall of Fame Bears defensive lineman Dan Hampton recalls hearing horrific wailing coming from a running back caught in a pile. Lo and behold, one of Hampton’s defensive teammates emerged with the football. On the sideline, Hampton says fellow defensive lineman Steve McMichael was clasping his hands together as if to squeeze something small. And McMichael was telling teammates, “Works every time.”

Says Hampton: “I’m guessing he worked somebody’s acorns over. The football is pretty important until you have to make a decision like that.”

Says McMichael: “I don’t know what body part Hampton is referring to. That’s all wives’ tales.”

In that case, let’s recount another wives’ tale. This one is from former linebacker Matt Millen, and it’s from a 1987 game between the Raiders and Vikings in Minneapolis.

“Kirk Lowdermilk, the Vikings center, was a tough kid,” Millen says. “But he was not a fan of mine, which I found out on the third play of the game.

“So there was a fumble, and we’re in the pile. I had one arm pinned, one arm on the ball. Lowdermilk is sitting down straight with his legs spread and bent over. The ball was in front of him. [Raiders defensive lineman] Bill …

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