Quote:
Originally Posted by Welpe
I do not think advantage/disadvantage should be applied to a safety related foul such as chop blocking.
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On the contrary, I think it's the only good way to apply the penalty as a deterrent in cases like this.
There are situations sometimes related to safety where advantage/disadvantage is not involved, i.e. where a player just does something hotheaded to an opponent, without hope of producing an advantage. Such is not the case here.
There would be no rule against chop blocking were chop blocking not effective in the game, as it was proven to be for many years. Because it is effective, teams are motivated to use it. When it was decided that this move was too dangerous to be allowed to continue to be used, the rule was adopted.
As has been explained in this thread, there are situations that fit the definition of chop block but which no reasonable mode of play could be adopted to avoid. It is easy to see that no advantage would be gained by a player who simply falls and is trying to get up, while opposing players who are engaged happen to sidestep into him. Whether there were a penalty for chop blocking or not would have no bearing on the actions of the first player which led him to face plant, because he had no motivation to do so. So it would be useless to apply penalties in such cases.
The situation might be different in the case of the adjacent players reach blocking in the same direction. Such a blocking scheme may be adopted with the knowledge that it could sometimes produce a chop block that was not assigned but could be reasonably expected to occur in certain cases. In that case the existence of a penalty against chop blocking could be expected to figure into the team's preparation and the players' actions on the field, which might be modified to have a greater chance of avoiding a chop block.
Robert in the Bronx