First Youngblood, Now Barber

TAMPA, Fla. — Today, Jack Youngblood is up for election to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, his resume highlighted by his grit-and-bear it performance in Super Bowl XIV, playing the entire game for the Los Angeles Rams on a broken leg.

Sunday, Tiki Barber will make a similar attempt, starting for the New York Giants at running back despite a broken left arm.

“I’ve seen it written, and I can’t argue with it, that Tiki is our most valuable player, on offense and maybe as a team,” Giant Coach Jim Fassel said Friday. “He has worked so hard to get to this point and committed himself so much.

“I remember when he hurt his arm, I think it was the Dallas game, and he wouldn’t say anything. He didn’t want X-rays--’I don’t care, I can play with it.’ And I remember when they X-rayed it and I thought it was a small fracture until I saw the X-ray. It wasn’t a small fracture, it was a broken arm. I mean, a broken arm, like anybody else that has a broken arm. But he was playing.”

For protection, Barber has been wearing a lightweight cast but will switch to an even lighter weight titanium plate strapped to his arm.

“It’s like the weight of a pin,” Fassel said. “It’s just an outside shield. And the thing, you can hit it with a hammer and it won’t dent. It’s an outside shield, so the inside of the arm is nothing more than tape holding the outside. . . . All he has on the inside is like a lot of guys wear--a long-sleeve shirt. That’s all he’ll have.”

Barber has fielded punts without difficulty this week, but Fassel said he would make a game-day decision on whether Barber or Ike Hilliard will return punts in the game.