Block Charge Videos

[Rob1968]

Originally Posted by HokiePaul

hmm ... I wasn't sure how to phrase this. I didn't want to say "when the defender obtained legal guarding position" because in my opinion, they never did. So the defender was never set/established in a legal position.

any suggestions for better terminology?

Many years ago, (I can't remember the specific year), the word "establish", in 4-23-2,3,4,5 was changed to "obtain" because the NF Committee thought that "establish" denoted a process that took some amount of time. They wanted the mind-set of officials and others concerned, to be more focused on the moment of any contact rather than some process that was developing.

In block/charge situations, many officials, players and coaches still struggle with the concept. I once won a bet with two mouthy opponents who kept using the "set/he wasn't set" phrase, by telling them that the word "set" couldn't be found in the Rule Book.