Why is it even legal for any NFL player to sign the NFL game ball let alone give it away? Isn’t it property of the NFL? What gives?
- Jinx
Actually, I believe the home team furnishes the football. The NFL just tells them what they can do with it. 
NFL players are fined for throwing (or presumably) handing footballs to people in the stands.
I think the fine thing is a rumor.
You can hand it to someone, but throwing it is discouraged because it could start a fight.
I don’t think there is a set fine or auto-review. It’s just discouraged.
Signing it is discouraged because the NFL considers it a poor image. The NFL looks to control what happens after a TD because of the image and professionalism issues.
It’s a $500 fine, automatically, for doing so whether you give it or throw it. I don’t have a cite but I’ve heard announcers on TV say it for a long time.
BTW, in the Arena leagues, fans get to keep them as you would a baseball or a hockey puck. My little brother has a sweet, $80, gold-foiled stamped and everything AF2 ball he caught after a DB tipped it into the stands.
In 1997 the fine was an automatic $2500
Philadelphia Inquirer Archives 1997
The fine is so steep because they don’t want fans fighting over the ball. After the Barry Bonds home run ball fights and legal fiasco, I wouldn’t be too surprised if the NFL had set the automatic fine a good deal higher.
In college football, a player throwing or even handing the ball to someone in the stands, would get tossed out and the team would get a 15-yard penalty.
And most likely security people would go in to the stands and ask for the ball back.
They don’t grow on trees you know.
Well, maybe rubber trees.
My mom has NFL season tickets and sits in the endzone. A few years ago she caught a field goal when the stadium hands were too slow in lifting the net that gets raised behind the goal posts.
She immediately put it in her coat and hid it, despite the pleas of all the fans around her who wanted to see it. In minutes, security was in her section demanding the football back. Everyone looked around – “What football?” They eventually gave up.
The following spring she took it to the NE Patriots’ training camp and had it signed by Drew Bledsoe (her favorite player). He kind of gave her a weird look, like, “How’d you get this?” But she now has it proudly displayed in the living room.
I wonder, if there is an automatic fine, who if anyone was fined for that. It surely wasn’t the kicker’s fault that the net was too slow.
I don’t believe kickers are fined for kicking the ball over the nets. It’s not their fault that the nets aren’t high enough.
What amazed me was at the U.S. Open, where they sent a ballboy into the stands to get mishit stray tennis ball from the guy who caught it.
Considering an Official Wilson NFL Game Ball retails for between $85-105, $500 is a bit of a markup, dontcha think?
It’s all relative for a player taking home $200,000 per game . . . .
The tennis tournament incident was likely for security reasons. Don’t want a fan throwing the ball back on to the court at an inappropriate time.
Of course, you can do that with a baseball too, but no one ever does.
Someone was kind enough to point out that reporters and announcers refer to the steep fine for throwing the ball into the stands.
I just heard an interview with Eagle return man Brian Mitchel, and he went on to explain how throwing it can be a fine, while handing to someone is not.
I believe there CAN be a fine, but it is not automatic and usually comes under scrutiny when the ball is thrown with disregard.
It’s always struck me as cheap and petty when they demand you return a football that went into the stands. I’m sure they cost more than a baseball, but what are we talking about, maybe a few balls per game? Look at how much fans love it when they get a foul ball at a baseball game. And they don’t usually spark an all-out fist fight over ownership.
With all the money flowing through that stadium, they ought to just let the fan keep the damn football. (That’s a plus for the Arena leagues that they did it the right way.)
When someone says you can’t do this or that for security reasons they usually mean “Shutup and do it my way I don’t want to explain to you why I am doing this because the real reason will make you mad.”
Do they search you for tennis balls when you go into the stadium because you might throw it onto the court. You could easily sneak one in and throw it onto the court.