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Old Tue Jun 17, 2008, 09:30am
ajmc ajmc is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2008
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I guess, if you really insist, you can pick at any pimple and it will eventually bleed. There's really nothing confusing about the Expanded Neutral Zone, unless you want to be confused.

NF 2.28.2 seems pretty clear when it advises, "The NZ may be expanded folowing the snap up to a maximum of 2 yards behind the defensive line of scrimmage, in the field of play, during any scrimmage down."

There doesn't seem to be much of a mystery to what this rule is intended to deal with, simply that a static line (The NZ) which is established while the ball is dead would be impractical to require remaining exactly static when the ball becomes alive considering all that can happen during line play. So the NZ expands to accomodate all the activity that happens with normal line play.

There are many factors in the game of football that have to be measured in inches, expanding the NZ is NOT one of them. You might reason the objective of this rule to simply mean, that if an offensive player doesn't find someone to contact in the NZ is not doing anything wrong, there is no reason for his failure to find someone to contact in the ENZ to be considered any greater problem.

The object of 7.5.12 is to prevent an interior lineman from seeking out a blocking target who is retreating into pass coverage (LB, DB) or to become an obstacle intentionally, or by wandering, into the passing lanes. This is clearly an issue for Advantage/ Disadvantage consideration on anything remotely close to a borderline situation.
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