American football had to change its rules because people were dying. The wedge formation was fully legal and incredibly dangerous:

The 1894 Harvard-Yale game, known as the "Hampden Park Blood Bath", resulted in crippling injuries for four players; the contest was suspended until 1897. The annual Army-Navy game was suspended from 1894 to 1898 for similar reasons.[62] One of the major problems was the popularity of mass-formations like the flying wedge, in which a large number of offensive players charged as a unit against a similarly arranged defense. The resultant collisions often led to serious injuries and sometimes even death.[63] Georgia fullback Richard Von Albade Gammon notably died on the field from concussions received against Virginia in 1897

Teddy Roosevelt stepped in and the schools created the NCAA and legalized the forward pass.

Also, at some point MLB had to formally ban the use of aluminum bats to protect the records in a largely numbers oriented game. Although they don't seem to want to single out cheaters who have records aside from informal bans to the Hall of Fame.