I'd make them take a man off the field and play with 10 men. Each personal foul would result in another player on the bench. There would have been 6 on 6 at the end of that Pittsburg/Cincinnati playoff game.

At least with sitting a man the team will likely lose anyway and the fans get to finish watching the game (albeit a few men short).

I'd also give fans a refund in case of the forfeit, for the record. No team should profit off of the intentional maiming of anyone on the other team.

And a forfit also cuts into contracts since many are now incentive laden instead of front loaded. It would be tough to keep people off the field who hadn't done anything wrong and have that type incentives in their contracts. The union also would have a fit. There's no way they'd sign off on that.

The best bet is suspend players for 4/8/16 games or for life for repeat offenders. That way some of those idiots couldn't hurt anyone.

You will disappoint the fans.

Let's say the infraction happened on the third play of the game.
Forfeit.
Millions lost from ad revenue.
I'm not for corporations.. But that's one big reason the rule can't fly.
Stick to punishing the player. Lifetime ban?

Here's a more realistic proposal that I've often thought might work.

If a player is injured due to being 'targeted' (I know, hard to prove so to speak) and misses one or more games, the player that caused the injury is suspended for the same number of games.

Don Nehlen, who coached at West Virginia University in the 1980s and 1990s. He suggested that the bars on the front of the helmet be removed.