I remember it happening more than once in just Steelers games. I do remember more often the play starts, but a lot of the time they don’t get the kick off before realizing that the whistles are blowing and there’s a time out. It does happen though, and as long as the rules permit it, the coach is doing nothing wrong.
It’s probably become more popular since the icing of Vanderjagt in the Steelers victory over the Colts in 2005.
Cowher also commented after he pulled the same icing on Mike Vanderjagt that he didn’t think it would work, but since he had the TO left, he thought he’d give it a try.
That kick was wide right by a mile, and the game ended 21-18.
Perhaps you should be lobbying for the NFL to drop the rule that allows coaches to call sideline time outs after the ball is ready for play, because I don’t see how following the rules the league has laid down makes it a ‘douche move’.
I agree with you. There’s a lot of effort to get inside the opponent’s head during a football game, including the smack talking that starts before the game, to the finger waving from the sideline, to icing the kicker. It’s never been unsportsmanlike to try to gain a psychological edge over the opponent.
Possibly. So long as it appears to work, and it is within the rules of play, it will continue to be done.
And perhaps if the NFL is going to consider some rule changes, they might take a look at relaxing the rules regariding actually trying to sack a quarterback. I know there’s great concern over not wanting these guys to get hurt unnecessarily, but sometimes it appears that the quarterbacks are being treated as if they’re in a professional tickling contest, not a football game.
One thing to keep clear – I don’t think anyone has a real problem with actual “icing” time-outs, where the time-out is called well before the snap. The issue here is this new trend of last-second time-outs where the point is to force the kicker to kick twice. That said…
They’re easy to differentiate – in order to pull this off, the coach has to tell the line judge ahead of time that he’s going to call a time-out.
Seems to me the way around this is that when the coach tells a ref he’ll be calling a time-out, he gets the time-out at that moment. None of this “watch me…there’s a time-out coming” nonsense. That way, if the coach wants to try and time it so he gets the time-out in but the kick goes off anyway, then that’d be fine. But he wouldn’t be able to cry about it if the ref doesn’t see/hear him until it’s too late.
This probably isn’t the best season to make this particular complaint, what with the slew of starting QBs out due to injury in only the first five weeks.