Some of you have probably already seen this college (American) football trick play by Driscoll Middle School in Corpus Christi, Texas.
Article (totalprosports.com)
video (YouTube)
Description: a player hands the ball to the quarterback, the quarterback just walks through the defenders, then starts running and makes a touchdown. My question is, why are the defenders standing there like dummies? Surely they must see that the quarterback has the ball in his hands.
Because he did something completely unexpected. He didn’t look like he was running a play, he looked like he was walking off the field.
My guess is that it’s because the center didn’t hike the ball in the normal fashion. Instead the quarterback leaned over and the center passed it over his shoulder. I wouldn’t be surprised if the QB said something like “Hey Jim, gimme the ball for a minute…”. The defense is expecting the offense to “run a play”. When the canter hands the ball over his shoulder to the QB, who starts walking upfield while his entire offense stands around doing nothing, that doesn’t look like a “play”. The defense therefore does what most people do when they see something completely unexpected: they stand around doing nothing while they try to figure out what’s going on.
Because they are kids. They don’t have the hunt and kill mentality of higher level players and, in general, aren’t looking to hit a seemingly defenseless kid.
I think the coach who called that play is a douche, taking advantage of a kid’s hesitance to hitting a defenseless player.
Sorry, but that’s not accurate at all. The opposing team didn’t do anything because they didn’t think the ball was live. It had nothing to do with being defenseless.
That’s a middle school, not a college, Arnold. Middle school = 7-8 grade (12-14 years old).
I guess in the US Middle school is the same as Special school in Australia, for the mentally challenged. If you tried a similar move in any Aussie sport you would wake up in hospital.
The player’s actions are outside what the defenders expect to see and, therefore, they think the ball is not in play. Something similar happened in the NFL a year or so back. A kickoff return specialist caught the ball deep in the endzone and nonchalantly started walking in the general direction of the sidelines and by a ref. The kicking team made no effort to tackle him, thinking he was treating it like a touchback, the ball was dead and he was about to hand the ball to an official. Seeing their coverage had broken down, all of a sudden the return man made a dash through a gap and raced with a live ball 100 + yards for the touch. It’s all acting like the ball is dead and if you’re real lucky every once in awhile the other team will buy into that assumption.
That is a wiley play in the NFL, embarassing as heck to the other team, but I’d agree with Hamlet that it’s a little cheesy when done at the grade school level.
It’s the kind of trick that only works once. Back in high school, while playing defense in a scrimmage game, I started waving my hands and shouting “I’m open!” while the opposing team’s quarterback was looking for someone to throw the ball to. He tossed it to me, and I ran a touchdown.
It only works once.
I’ve seen this before with a slight variation.
The offense will line up, and the center will inform the quarterback that they have the “wrong” ball. It’s not uncommon for middle/high school teams to each have their own type of ball to be used while on offense. The quarterback yells to his coach, loud enough that the defense can hear, that they have the wrong ball. The center hands it to him (a legal snap), and he walks casually towards the sideline. When he sees an opportunity he takes off towards the endzone.
Wow that is really…something or other.
As I said in Aussie sport no-one would stand around wondering what the referee thought, what the ruling would be, you would just get smashed.
What kind of coach would not tell his team to bury anyone heading toward scoring with the ball in hand? I think it would be a great opportunity to smash the idiot that tried it.
So… My roommate (well, roommate from last year) just posted on facebook: “Hey, check out this play. My dad’s the coach who called it!” Yeah, no shit. The school is getting bombarded with interview requests from national shows.
He wasn’t headed toward the goal, though, until it was too late. The kid walks sideways like he’s going off the field. He doesn’t make a break for it until it’s too late for the defense to catch him.
No he walks past 75 who should just drive his head into the turf.
Did you watch the video? He just walked right through the defensive line.
Word has it the play is called “the penalty play”. The QB is calling out that the refs forgot to mark off a 5 yard penalty (or marked off 10 yards on a 15 yarder) - either way, it’s a bogus claim as the ball is (obviously) live.
(Go Bears!)
The original “wrong ball” play:
Involves a little more theatrics than the OP’s version.
Would you shut the fuck up. This isn’t about any retarded Aussie-US trolling. Take some 8 year olds and confuse them and you never know what they’ll do. There’s probably 50 instances of coaches trying to do a play similar to this and the kid getting dogpiled right away. The one that worked ended up on Youtube.
Get back on your meds.
Please check the forum you’re in. Keep it civil, or take it to the Pit. Thanks.