Seriously, I need someone to 'splain this to me. I thought I had a working knowledge of NFL rules, apparently I’m wrong.
In the Green Bay-Miami game, there were 4 seconds left on the clock. Green Bay lines up for a FG, and Rayner hits it from 55 yards. (Sweet)
Thomas, from Miami, is called for some foul I’ve never heard of. In essence, he shouted what is assumed to be “Shift!” that ultimately caused GB’s line to move a bit early. After all that, the kick was good anyway.
Given all this, it seems to make sense that GB would be allowed to decline the penalty, as any team would after doing what they were trying to do in the first place. Instead, they were moved to a position to make a 40 yard FG. Of course, there was a facemask penalty on the subsequent kick (that was good) and sent GB to another 55 yard attempt. However, because the offense commited the penalty withing the last 2 minutes, the time was run off the clock and the half was over.
So what we have is GB being penalized, in effect, 3 points for what Miami did in the first place.
Not sure if I want to pit the official, the actual rules, or just bad lick. But I really am lost in figuring out how the defense can commit a penalty, get called for it, and ultimately benefit from it. Bonus question: What other cases have there been where a penalty helped the team that commited it?
Once an offensive player moves before the snap the play is blown dead. The made field goal was nothing more than a practice shot. It makes no difference that the penalty was for encroachment instead of a false start.
You have to understand the motive behind False Start and encroachment. They’re both designed to protect the quarterback or in the case mentioned the kicker. The play is blown dead immediately, anything that happens afterwards is superfluous. Sucks if the subsequent result is a 55yd field goal or a 70 yard strike to a wide open receiver. The point is you don’t want someone running in unopposed to a undefended quarterback/kicker.
I agree that the rules are getting a bit weird. My example is from the Atlanta/Pittsburgh game, though and it, too, dealt with field goals.
Atlanta kicked a field goal and made it from about 56 yards. The Pittsburgh coach had called a timeout from the sidelines though, so they blew the play dead.
But when they showed the replay, it appeared that the play was already in motion when the timeout was called. Why didn’t they at least look at it? Is there no review for these kinds of plays? It was in the last few minutes, so I know the call to review can only come from “upstairs” but this seemed like it should have at least been looked at.
And don’t get me started on Interference rules. Some of them don’t make sense to me anymore.
The announcers said that the time out starts when the official notices the coach, knowing that, it seemed like the right call was made when I saw the replay. The official, however, clearly didn’t start motioning and whistling until after the snap (but that’s ok according to the announcers).
A Time out should be granted when the coach or player asks for it, as long as the ball is dead. If the whistle is late, that’s not preferred, but sometimes it can’t be helped. At any rate, a whistle blown during a play that shouldn’t have been blown will usually require the down to be replayed (the only time it won’t is if a player has the ball when the whistle was blown; his team can the elect to count the down and take the ball at that spot). *
If an offensive lineman moves before the play starts, this is a dead ball foul and nothing after that counts. The reason this is a deadball foul is not really for the protection of the QB: it’s because once a lineman moves, he has indicated the start of a play. If the ball wasn’t snapped at that time, then he started the play too early and we have no play. It is impossible for him to return to a legal position before the snap.
This is also the reason fumbles are not reviewable if the runner has been ruled down (or did the NFL fudge that this year and allow that after all?) – if the runner actually fumbled the ball, then the only thing replay will prove is that there was an indavertent whistle, for which the only option in this case is to replay the down (since the ball was loose).
Fumbles are now live balls whether or not the runner is down. A play whistled dead can be reviewed to determine possession even if the player is called down on the field (as of this season).
Obviously, this is stupid. And dangerous. And negates one of the three most important mantras of coaching football: play to the whistle.
The NFL competition committee needs to be reconstituted, methinks.