Quote:
Originally Posted by Rich
The piece that nobody seems to be mentioning is that on this play, I'm not sure that I even *see* the helmet sitting on the player's head backwards anyway.
If I'm the R, I *might* see it, as I'm the one getting the foul. But maybe not as I'm throwing the flag after the face mask foul and turning my attention then to the blocking I'm charged with watching.
If I'm a wing, I'm not looking at the runner, I'm looking at the point of attack blocks and activity.
When the helmet comes completely off, our attention is turned to that and we're easily able to kill that.
It's easy for us to say what we'd do from the safety of our keyboards.
BTW, I would not have a problem with a crew mate killing the play here. I wouldn't consider it an IW (for the purposes of the crew member buying all night at the establishment we visit on the way home). I would have no problem telling a coach or an assignor why it was killed, either.
However, the rule says "completely off." Those words were put there for a reason and I have no problem following that, either.
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Rich, I agree with everything you say here except I believe you have to treat it as an inadvertant whistle, even though I wouldn't make my crewmate buy either. We'd have a real mess on our hands if we'd have not thrown a flag on this play and then ruled a runner down while he was still running and the offensive team had to take a loss of yardage with no option of replaying the down. Admittedly, this was a pretty obvious foul and I hope that one of us would get a flag on this, but we can't assume that will happen.