By Ron Borges

Patriots nose tackle Vince Wilfork is a good fellow, one of the best young nose tackles in the game and a valuable part of New England’s undefeated season. He is also a guy who needs to get a grip on his emotions and it will take more than the $15,000 he was fined for poking at Giants’ running back Brandon Jacobs’ eye to do it.
Wilfork was quite rightly fined Friday for that act but he should have been suspended for a game because when a 360-plus pound guy starts poking his finger inside an opponent’s facemask, as Wilfork did last Saturday night, what could easily result is an injury no amount of money could have repaired.
Were it a solitary event one could say fine him and move on but in Wilfork’s case he has become a serial cheap shot artist while insisting, “I’m not a dirty player. I respect the game too much.’’
Perhaps he does but this is the third time this season he’s been fined for excessive violence and even in baseball three strikes and you’re out. That is not the case for Wilfork only because NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is walking on eggshells these days when it comes to dealing with the Patriots on matters of discipline. I wonder what Albert Haynesworth would have gotten for the same act?
The action occurred during a heated exchange between Wilfork and Jacobs not long after Jacobs had begun to run roughshod over several of Wilfork’s teammates, including the king of cheap shots, safety Rodney Harrison. Wilfork has written on his website that he not only didn’t poke Jacobs in the eye but wasn’t trying to, even though that raises a simple question: if you weren’t trying to poke him in the eye why were your big, fat fingers inside his facemask at eye level? Were you trying to clean his contacts?
Wilfork seemed to hang his hat on not having actually succeeded in poking Jacobs in the eye, as if that good fortune proved he wasn’t trying to do what he was clearly trying to do. If this were a first offense the fine would have been enough but Wilfork is now a serial offender when it comes to cheap shots this season.
He was fined $12,500 earlier this year for injuring the knee of Bills’ quarterback J.P. Losman when he hit him low illegally with his elbow, a blow that was both against the rules and unnecessary. In that case, too, Wilfork pled innocent, saying he didn’t mean to hit Losman even though the video tape clearly showed him reach out with his elbow and strike Losman in the knee, causing an injury that kept him out of the next two games. When a guy as big as Wilfork slams you in the knee, brother, it ain’t no accident and it doesn’t feel good, either.
Wilfork insisted then that he wasn’t a dirty player either but he was fined $5,000 a few weeks later for unnecessary roughness on a late hit on Dallas tight end Jason Witten. Do we see a trend here?
Now it’s up to $15,000 per assault but on his site Wilfork said yesterday, “When things like that happen its all heat of the moment and once the moment is gone it’s over. There was no hard feelings and I really think the commentators did a great job of blowing it up.’’
Translation? “I still don’t get it.’’
Playing hard is laudable. Pushing, shoving, hitting late, hitting illegally low or sticking your pudgy fingers inside someone else’s facemask is neither laudable nor playing hard. Do it once and you can argue it was an accident. Do it twice and you can maybe cop to “heat of the moment.’’
Do it three times, Vince, and take a seat.
Goodell didn’t have the stones to do that and one can understand why with the playoffs looming for New England’s undefeated team, which is clearly on a historic mission. But the quest to make history shouldn’t give Vince Wilfork a pass to try and maim or blind an opponent.
Was it his intention to injure Losman’s knee when he hit him low? No, but that’s what happened when he did. Was it his intention to blind Jacobs when he poked two very large fingers inside the running back’s facemask? Only Wilfork knows but it was only blind luck that he didn’t and there’s no excuse for doing what he did. You want to talk trash, as he claims was going on, then don’t talk with your hands.
Vince Wilfork dodged a bullet last weekend but he better be careful because he’s getting a reputation around the NFL for being exactly what he insists he isn’t. A cheap-shot artist.
For a player as talented as he is, and for one with as light-hearted a personality off the field, that’s a shame. It’s also something he better take note of because in two weeks people in black-and-white striped shirts will be watching him very closely.
Judging by his actions this season, sadly they should.