Truly not trying to be mean spirited by mentioning this. I just saw this today and thought it might help people understand where Leslie Knope is coming from with his comments. Make sure to check out around 11 minutes where a similar play occurs and is called a scissor kick and is given a red, even though it wasn't even as high as Pickford's challenge, which makes such a tackle worse and more dangerous — hence Virgil's bad injury.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUrA4qCVfLE