The fair catch rule does make sense the way it’s written. The kicking team always has the option of touching a kick before the receiving team. The fair catch signal gives the receiving team the right to catch the ball without the other team coming up and clobbering the receiver.
Take the example of a punt. It gets boomed in the air and the receiver makes a fair catch signal, but then the ball sails over the receiver’s head. The kicking team tries to down it. This is legal.
Or the kick is short and the receiver can’t get to it. The kicking team will try to touch it then too.
The interference rule means that the kicking team can’t go up to a receiver who has made a valid fair catch signal and get in the way of that guy trying to make the catch. Such as touching the ball before it gets to him.
I don’t think it is legal. When the kicking team touches the punt it is an illegal touching penalty. Since it is a spot foul it doesn’t get explictly called a penalty hardly ever, and just gets called downing the ball. However if the kicking team touches the ball, then the reciving team tries to run with it, and ends up fumbling to the kicking team they have the option of taking the illegal touching penalty at the spot and keeping the ball.
So is it definitely true that you can do an onside “pooch” kick and recover said onside kick via catching it in mid air?
I ask because of a very contentious play in NCAA football this year involving Louisville and West Virginia.
It was in the 4th quarter, with roughly 8 minutes left in the game Louisville is leading 24-7. West Virginia scores a touchdown and then opts for the onside kick. They essential do a pooch kick, and one of the West Virginia players gets to the ball and recovers it in mid air.
A penalty flag is thrown down. After several minutes, the referees say, “There was no penalty on the play, West Virginia ball.” I just assumed it was the correct call. West Virginia drives down the field to score a field goal, making it 24-17, and then after forcing Louisville to punt they quickly drive down the field for a touchdown, tying it up at 24-24 with virtually no time left in regulation. In overtime West Virginia ends up winning something like 46-44.
A few days later the Big East front office releases the statement that the onside kick call was blown by the officials on the field, the Big East offers an apology to Louisville. Which was a decision I actually disagree with. The game was over and there was no way to reverse the results, saying there was a blown call on the field just instill doubt in the officials.
As I’m wont to do I read many college football message boards. The Louisville fans feel that the reason the call was blown was because it is simply illegal to recover an onside kick in mid air. The West Virginia fans believe it is legal to recover an onside kick in the air, and they point to the explanation the officials on the field gave for throwing down the flag. The refs said they threw the flag because at first they felt a member of the kickoff team had impeded the ability of a player on the recovery team to make the catch, and they explained that in a situation like that West Virginia could recover the ball mid-air but they couldn’t impede the recovery team from making a catch in the process. They ended up saying there was no penalty because after conversing with one another, the refs said they felt the Louisville player wasn’t actually trying to make a play on the ball and thus he couldn’t have been interfered with.
So what’s the correct ruling here? Can you in fact make a mid-air catch to recover an onside kick?
Please, this is incorrect. It is NOT an illegal touching situation. We see this ALL THE TIME. Fair catch signalled, ball over receiver’s head, kicking team batting ball back from the end zone line into play, etc. No flags, nothing.
The receiving team can; the kicking team cannot (I am assuming here that the NFL rule and the NCAA rule are the same). This is why kickers aim to have to ball hit the turf immediately, and then bounce up.
The kicking team can only recover if the ball has hit the grounnd first and the ball has traveled 10 yards.
I could see guys wearing specially designed shoes, the tops of which are shaped like kicking tees…
That’s interesting about the illegal touching on the punt.
That seems to be badly written My best guess is that it covers situations where the guy signals a fair catch then backs away. If the defense bats the ball to try to stop a touchback the reciever team can then advance it regardless that it had been a fair catch earlier. I believe the in the 'In flight" was written to cover the situation where the back batted ball never hits the ground before it is snatched by the reciever.
You cannot jump and touch the ball before it gets to the punt reciever if he is in position to catch it…
I believe that rule, 4. should be farther addended with “as on a ball the punt reciever has obviously given up on” And may actually write to NFL to ask.
Yes, you can recover an onside kick in mid-air. The problem was that the officials waved off the interference call. A receiver has the right to catch any ball coming to him and cannot be interfered with even if ther is no fair catch signal.
NCAA rules state that the kicking team may recover a free kick (i.e. a kickoff) if it has passed the plane of and remains behind the restraining line, which it did in this case.
However, the receiver should have had the right to make the catch without being hit. The penalty is “interference with the opportunity to make a fair catch”.
Elam in his prime at Mile High might be able to do it. Say the punt is fair-caught at the 50 or closer. He did hit a 60-yarder, so if conditions were right he might’ve been able to pull it off since you get to kick from the line of scrimmage. Some wind in that direction wouldn’t hurt and it’d be better if it was warm in Denver.
That said, I’d be amazed to see a team try it. A hail mary just seems more likely.
Remember that on kickoffs there are tees. They are 1-inch high in the NFL and 3-inches in college. Those tees provide significant lift. The ball won’t travel as far off the ground.
I think the confusion is in how a kicking team can recover when the receiving team calls a fair catch. By rule…er, lemme try to simplify this.
Team A has the ball and kicks to team B. While the ball is in the air, team B player calls fair catch. Team A cannot touch him nor interfere with his catch attempt while also allowing a 2 or 3 yard (I think) “cushion”. However, if team B player misses the catch, any team A player downs the ball on contact barring the ball going out of bounds or into the end zone. In addition, if team B player calls fair catch or not, and the ball hits any team B player before hitting the ground, the ball is in play and may be recovered by either team. If the ball hits the ground before anything else, it’s only live if any team B player establishes possession of the ball before the play is ruled dead.
Did that help any of this?
Here’s something I’ve always wondered. Is there a distance an on-side kick can travel before it can’t be recovered by the kicking team? In an on-side kick, the ball first touches the ground and after 10 years can be recovered by the kicking team. But in a standard formation kick, the ball can land on the opponent’s 20 yard line without the kicking team able to recover though they may be the first team to gain possession after the ball hits the ground.
(God Almighty I love football!)
In pro football, all free kicks are able to covered by the kicking team anywhere on the field. If the ball lands in the end zone and the kicking team recovers it, it’s a touchdown for the kicking team.
In college ball, if the receiving team lets the ball roll into the end zone and doesn’t touch it, it’s a touchback.
One thing that players in both leagues forget that if they receive a free kick in the field of play and they don’t catch it cleanly and it bounces into the end zone, they don’t have to run the ball out. They can down it and get a touchback.
In high school ball, all kicks are touchbacks once the ball goes into the end zone. You can’t run kicks out of the end zone in high school.
Actually, it’s called illegal touching every time, but illegal touching of a punt (and all kicks in NCAA) is not a penalty (with flags) – it’s a violation (beanbags, doesn’t offset other fouls, etc).
