[mcrowder]

Anyone else out there have to deal with crazy made-up rules that aren't printed anywhere?

We get to the field the other day for 7th grade games, and the coaches tell us that the District had gotten together and agreed on several rule changes for 7th grade:

A) On a punt, only the down linemen can rush.
(Note - when asked how MANY down linemen can rush, we were told, "How ever many you have." When I ask him - what if all 11 line up on the line in a 3-pt stance, can they rush, he says, "Of course not", so I ask again - ok, how many can they rush - obviously 11 is "of course not" what about 10... 9... etc. I never get an answer to this question.)

B) Linebackers can't blitz.
(Note - when asked to define "Blitz", neither coach could oblige, nor could they agree on what defines a linebacker with regards to this rule. They also could not agree on whether a linebacker can cross the neutral zone on a running play).

C) No rushing on extra points (at least THIS one was straight forward, although neither coach had any idea how we should penalize it if someone decided to rush).

Friggin' Calvin-Ball. After all of this nonsense, the crew basically got together and decided we would call normal rules, and let the coaches police themselves on these made-up rules. Lo and behold, coaches had to be told to shut up, arguing across the field over whether a linebacker blitzed or not. It required a sideline warning on both of them at one point.

When I mentioned to them between games that somehow 9-10 year olds can play football with regular rules, and it boggled my mind that they felt the need to change the rules for kids older than that, the coaches were completely clueless as to the reasons for these Calvinball rules.

So --- anyone else have to deal with this nonsense, and if so, do you do as we did, and simply ignore bizarro rule changes unless they come from officiating supervisors?