Pittsburgh Steelers player, Alex Highsmith, apologized for what many considered a classless act from him and a teammate, barely a week after Buffalo Bills player, Damar Hamlin, suffered a cardiac arrest on the football field.
The Buffalo News reported that at the conclusion of the Steelers game against the Cleveland Browns on Sunday, Highsmith sacked the opposing quarterback, Deshaun Watson. In the aftermath of the play, the linebacker remained on his back on the ground. One of Highsmith’s teammates, defensive end DeMarvin Leal
, walked over and placed both hands on his chest, seemingly pretending to perform CPR on the linebacker.Football fans were instantly offended. Many fans took to Twitter to discuss the players’ actions and express their dismay towards Highsmith and Leal behavior.
According to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Steelers linebacker admitted that the timing wasn’t right and he erred in making the move that he and his teammates had done countless times before.
“I just don’t want people to think of me that way and think I was doing anything [intentionally],” Highsmith told the media outlet. “Because I would never, ever, ever, ever want to do that intentionally, and I never ever would do that.”
“I just want people to know that I have nothing but love for Damar and his family,” Highsmith said. “When that happened, I was shook for a couple days. Me and my wife, we were watching the game, we immediately saw it and intentionally started praying, intentionally prayed for him, his parents, the doctors, the nurses. Because me and her, we’re both followers of Christ. We both believe that prayer is powerful, and I’m just thankful for the miraculous work God has done with Damar’s life. I just want people to know that there was nothing intentional about that. It was never planned, none of that.”