Does this site ever discuss football?
 

On the surface it appears all the football threads have been deleted?

What's up with that?

The other threads just get hidden after a certain time period. At the bottom of the forum there's a "Display Options" section. Change the "From the" tab to a longer time frame to show the older threads.

Yep they just get hidden by default after a certain time. You can change your forum display preferences in the User CP to adjust that. I have mine set to not hide anything.

Its a lack of traffic on this board.

What do you want to discuss? If you have something to discuss throw it out there. But it is the off-season and I know me and others are doing other sports on some level too. Not much to discuss in high school as it appears there are no real big changes for this coming year.

Peace

During football season we do.

A lot of NCAA guys have moved on due to the lack of NCAA rules discussion. Not a criticism, per se, but an observation.

Another reason I wish states would drop Fed football rules and use NCAA. So much better code and officials moving up no longer have to worry about 2 different sets of rules and penalty enforcements.

Message/bulletin boards are decreasing overall. Facebook, instagram, and snapchat seem to be replacing them.

So 48 states should move in the direction of 2?

To each his own. I know a lot of people that work both that enjoy the simplicity of NFHS.

Also, what Rich said.

Not going to happen. Everyone is not like Texas when it comes to football. Some states hardly care. It is basketball most of the year and football only is a concern for those schools that really care. So I do not see any push for NCAA rules when it only is a focus at the high school level for such a short period of the year. I doubt my state would ever consider this seriously. And all other sports are NF, why have a solution where there is no problem?

Let me also add, I do both codes and NF are much easier to navigate. NCAA has exceptions to everything and you have to know the rules and the exceptions to the rules. NF rules are straight-forward. This happens, this is the application. NCAA is more like, "This happens, but we might do this if this happens and we might do that, if that happens."

Peace

Nuff said
 

+1 - Nuff said

Well why not? Then everyone would get to enjoy hearing high school coaches tell you "Come on that's a college rule!"

"Yes, exactly coach."

Though I didn't understand why Texas football had to be so special as to not follow the rules that every other high school sport in the state did, I did not mind that we called under NCAA rules. I think it is the better ruleset but I'm also not about to advocate that other states adopt it.

Well unless we play NFL rules, we would hear so from of that anyway. College rules are often not even understood by college coaches and even college coaches try to argue with officials about rules that do not apply to the NCAA but to NF. I had several situations where a coach wanted us to apply a high school rule to a college game. It is kind of funny when it happens.

Well again that is a subjective point of view. It is different, but better? Well not sure I agree with that point of view. Again there are so many exception to things where NF is straight forward. Now you can say some things make no sense, but at least there are not the amount of exceptions that you have to know. And officials screw them up at the college level often and I do not think I want have brand newer officials messing up simple applications the way experienced officials have issues doing at the college level.

Peace

Different, yes, better, not necessarily.

Football is a great, but very complex game, involving serious physical contact, played by participants between ages 6 to 60+. It seems reasonable there would be separate codes focusing on rule adjustments to accommodate the significant maturity and skill capabilities.

Do Interscholastic players, generally posses the skills to comprehend the complexities of the game at the same level Collegiate or Professional players do? There are clearly obvious physical differences between the 3 major levels.

Should HS students receive the same instruction material as those in Undergraduate or Post Graduate study programs? Participation in certain sports activities share the progressive learning process practiced in general "learning".

The only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time. It's really not about establishing an easier, or shorter, path for officiating progress. That path already exists and the obstacles and pot holes existing are, to some degree, designed and intended to challenge the travelers.

Absolutely. I just found it amusing because they didn't even realize they were playing under college rules.


Agree, it is definitely subjective. I'm just speaking from my personal opinion on that. And yes, NFHS is definitely simpler overall.

I think that is why it will never change. All those changes and difference would have to be learned overnight basically and it would cause some problems. I just do not see this change right or wrong because of what is necessarily easier, but it would totally not fit the NF philosophy. Believe it or not the NF does use NCAA rules in any other sport and they are not going to change just for that one sport IMO.

Peace

I did some small college freshman games many moons ago. Back then, there were very few differences, even in penalty enforcements, so with help from my crew mates, I could bluff my way through.

I'd never try that today.

Point of Parliamentary Procedure
 

Actually Rich, there are 49 "Members" which use NFHS Rules for Football! (District of Columbia)

Interestingly, all 51 "Members" use NFHS Rules For Basketball

I didn't say members, I said states. Taxation without representation!

Doesn't New York State use NCAA rules for girls basketball? So maybe 50.5 members. ;)

Yes. Not because of 2 vs. 48 but because, as I stated, it is a better code for football. We've had many members in our organization over the years that have come from Fed states. I don't know of a single person that wants to ever go back to Fed. If they had to move, many would probably just work small college and not HS. I have 2 ex-Fed guys on my crew right now and I'd give you 100 bucks for ANY nice thing they said about Fed as long as you'd give me 5 bucks for everything they liked about NCAA over Fed. I could probably go a dollar and still come out way ahead.

The great thing about states adopting the NCAA rule set is they can make whatever changes to them that's good for their state and no one cares. Does Fed still get their panties in a wad about states going off the reservation? I know they did in baseball some time ago in Texas -- and I know most states I've heard of respect the Fed rule allowed exceptions. Texas has 40+ exceptions (mostly administrative). The cool thing is that on Saturday, we go work a small college game and virtually everything we call on the field is the same. I can call a fifth year HS guy in an emergency, loan him a shirt (if necessary), and he can be on the field in a college game (actually how I worked my first college game). Have any of you Fed guys done that with someone who didn't have actual college experience and/or didn't know NCAA rules?

I can't speak to what these unknown concerns are, but I have to say the NCAA rule set is better since Redding took over as Editor. He's cleaned a lot of things up.

One thing really doesn't have much to do with the other. The reason basketball, for example, plays Fed rules is that teams travel to other states often for tournaments. They need a consistent code among states if that occurs, which doesn't happen a lot in football -- at least not in Texas. I think for the most part, since the rules (Fed) exist, they just use them without a lot of thought.

Again, the change to NCAA rules would be a huge adjustment for all officials, not just the experienced ones. There are so many exceptions involved and it has little or nothing to do with what Redding might put in a book. Not everyone reads that book in the first place.

This IMO is why this change will never happen. Also there are NCAA rules that are not appropriate for most high school kids, like blocking below the waist rules that NCAA has. The FBZ is a lot easier to navigate than what the NCAA has and the NCAA is often very confusing. IMO you really need 7 officials for that kind of application and 5 would be hard to apply the rule properly IMO as well.

Peace

As far as basketball is concerned, 50 states may play under NFHS rules but quite a few states use some form of a shot clock as I recall. That's a huge inconsistency. It doesn't stop teams from crossing state lines to play. There are just as many football teams that cross state lines to play games as there are basketball teams in the states I've officiated in. Sure, if a basketball team travels for a tournament, they may play more than one game but schools that are close to state lines routinely play each other in many sports. They're natural rivalries in areas.

I don't buy the argument concerning officials only having to learn one rule set. In our association of 140 officials, less than 10% officiate college football. Why change the rules for less than 10% of the membership? Fewer HS student-athletes play college football, so the argument to change the rules for the benefit of the players doesn't hold water either. State associations are concerned with how the rules affect student-athletes, not officials. That's exactly the stance they should be taking.

The deal is simple: Only the organiz'ns that have formal input to the rules have to play by the rules. Anybody can play by anyone's rules set; they publish them, after all. For that matter, they can play by a previous edition; many adult leagues do that for football. And they can mix, match, and alter to please.

But you no play-a da game, you no make-a da rules. Seems perfectly reasonable for a governing body to say, we who are concocting the rules -- indirectly, all the member ass'ns together -- agree to play by whatever we come up with. That's how they get feedback. So sure, a state ass'n can use Fed rules with their own modif'ns, but then they have no say in the repair & maintenance of Fed rules in subsequent editions.

I'm really confused why there seems to be such concern about "different" rule codes. American Football is a great game played by people between the ages of 8 and 60+, that involves complex strategy, continual aggressive physical contact and competition.

The fact that there are rule accommodations to satisfy the differences between children (NFHS), young men (NCAA) and elite professional grown men (NFL) including significantly different instructional, performance and marketing objectives seems only logical.

Does it make sense to expect an interscholastic athlete to be able to immediately grasp the complexities and physical requirements of an experienced collegiate athlete, or a seasoned elite level professional, or expect those at higher performance levels to be burdened by restrictions and protocols designed to protect beginners?

Football is a progressive sport through which participants advance through the levels by means of accomplisment and ability demonstrated at pervious levels

And yet the state of Texas seems to do just fine.

While I don't think 2 should trump 48 or 49, those states show that NCAA rules work at the prep level, as well. There's just no compelling reason to play them.

Sure they work. The high schools and the pros started out playing by the same rules the college teams used. But then they had reasons for developing their own.

What's bizarre is when in recent time Fed football has gone out of its way to sound different from NCAA when there was no real reason to, other than to look original. The team K rule, I mean.

Sometimes the reason has just been, "You're sticks in the mud, ours are better." That must be how Fed, NAIA, and NJCAA wound up playing by those "Alliance" football rules that Fed instigated. It's not like the NAIA players were any less mature than NCAA's. Similarly in the interval when there were 3 regional rule sets used by the colleges, and then another interval when there were 2. (And that was just in the USA, let alone Canada.) Or when different pro leagues use different rules. Or different youth leagues. Usually it's a matter of some people wanting to change something, others wanting to keep it the same, and they split.

I do not think it is that petty. I think football at the high school level has different concerns and NCAA often does not address them or the main thing, you have college coaches that try to always find holes they can exploit. Those same exploitation do not take place in NF because there are more coaches and many coaches are not only coaches by profession. I do not think the NF goes out of their way, they just do not see the need to change something that is simple that is mostly taking place at the college level. Again, the players and skill level is very different from high school to college. Heck some even feel that what goes on at the D3 level for example should not be influenced by what happens at the D1 level. So many layers to what is going on, you are not going to get total agreement on what should be changed or how the rules should be the same.

Peace

Absolutely agree, it's not a question of "better" it's a matter of different objectives, designed to deal with different skill sets. NFHS Rules don't just apply to Varsity level, there's JV, Freshman, Modified and a whole gaggle of Youth Football that follow NFHS rules, with countless adjustments designed specifically for the individual leagues and groups.

"One size fits all", may be one of the dumbest objectives mankind has even considered, it NEVER, EVER works as well as expected about ANYTHING.

Consistency is usually a very good thing, except when it's taken down to the gnat's eyelash level for no practical, or common sense reason. Football is a great game that has always relied on common sense judgment by players, coaches and officials whose focus should be on the situation unfolding in front of them.

Not to mention that kids as young as 6 (or maybe even 5) play under NCAA rules in Texas and do just fine.

I do not think anyone is suggesting they could not do alright, but your state has to be committed to that from top to bottom. The NF only requires states to follow their rules. I do not see youth football across the country using NCAA games in many states as well. You do not see that in other sports and there is a reason for that.

Peace

I didn't say it was petty, just differences of opinion.
Indeed, and that's the reason Fed has usually given for their differences, and usually they're right.
Think about this: Where is a loophole more likely to be found & exploited: among full-time pros, or among a far greater number who include some part-timers & volunteers? Fed has so many more games played by their rules (not even limited to their member ass'ns), the exploitation's usually going to come first there, rather than in the smaller world of NCAA rules users.
Then how do you explain their adopting a provision which, although it was intended to have the same effect as a recently-adopted NCAA one regarding approach by the kicking team to their free kick line, was worded differently in a way that made it hard to administer if officials were actually to take it literally (which I'm sure they didn't)? Why didn't they just adopt NCAA's language? They used to cooperate via a liaison committee with NCAA, ideas going back & forth, sometimes adopting the same change at the same time if they both found it appropriate.

I'll give you an example of a difference that existed for about 60 yrs. as a result of Fed's change: # of forward passes allowed per down. When the Football Rules Committee (pre-dating NCAA) legalized the forward pass in 1906, they limited forward passes to one per down. All the major codes kept it that way, except Fed. Shortly after Fed started writing their own rules for football, they took several years to deliberate things; you can see their sec'y's notes on this in their archives from that time. Taking nothing for granted, they looked over the whole code, not only for what different needs pre-collegians might have, but what could be improved generally. They said, why should forward passes be limited to once/down? So they abolished that requirement, reinstating it only recently. I don't know why they reinstated it. I also don't know why the other codes kept it. I think it makes the game marginally better to allow more than one forward pass per down, and it also makes administration easier when you don't have to see whether a swing pass preceding a forward pass went forward.

Coaches or individuals that would be involved in FED Rules would not likely do it for a living as a college coach would. That was the point, not how many play under those rules. And because there is so much more money on the line in a college game, there are coaches always looking for an advantage or figure out a way to do something that might need to be addressed by the rules committee. Not so much the case as something that happens in Nevada for example, might not every take place in Ohio. Even the A-11 Offense that was developed was a rare situation. But Bill Belichick or Oregon has nothing better to do than to find a rule to exploit. They have more training time and more practice time with their players and systems. A HS football coach might not ever have a player in the off-season just based on other sports and other activities.

Also I think the FED and rightfully so does not want to have to deal with the logic of the NCAA or any other level for that matter. Just like the NCAA is not going to use NFL rules for their stuff either. Different consequences to a rules change and a different staff as officials to train for those rules as well. Making the rules the same only benefits really a very small percentage of people.

Peace

That's exactly what Al is saying and has said before. It's simply not true.

Look I've been very clear that I'm not advocating this for other states but it works just fine in Texas and I presume also Massachusetts. Most of the concerns I've seen raised simply are unfounded.


Sure you do. Youth baseball. Most leagues use an OBR based rule set.

You are advocating for something that does not even translate to other states. For one, not all states take football the way they do in Texas. We do not have spring football. You cannot play other schools during the off-season in any way. Heck they just got rid of contact for the most part during the summer, which was not traditionally allowed anyway during the summers. So I get why you would think what Texas does should apply to others, but I am just saying it is not taking that seriously in other places.

Not true here or has not always been the case. Many leagues used FED rules for their travel leagues as an example or they would use a hybrid of the FED rule with some other modified rules. And in other sports like Basketball, Soccer or even Volleyball do not use NCAA rules or pro rules to govern their sports across the board. Softball when I was doing it at the youth level never used NCAA rules. I am also not saying that levels did not use variations of rules, I am saying that NCAA rules were not used because it was not appropriate to the younger levels. It is great that Texas wants to be different (what else is new ;)) but that does not mean the other states are trying to follow, that is really all I am saying. And if football is the main sport this even applies, what makes you think the NF is just going to give up rules for one sport? Not going to happen.

Peace

Does this site ever discuss football?
 

Thank you for proving you don't actually read my posts Jeff.

I said I'm not advocating and have been very clear about that. I'm not saying it will happen or that it should. Actually take the time to read my posts instead of looking for points to argue.

And Babe Ruth, USSSA, AAU, Pony and Little League are all based on OBR. So yes most youth baseball is played under OBR. I'm simply refuting your point that no other sport plays different rules between youth and high school. It's simply not true.

These are professional based rules that are more complex than NFHS rules. So again, there are other sports that do it.

I read your post, but I do not agree with them always. :D

Again you assume that Babe Ruth, USSSA, AAU, Pony and Little League are the only youth baseball played here. Kids are not playing baseball that much anymore (at least not here) and many youth leagues are not associated with those organizations for all kinds of reasons. Little League might be the most popular you listed on this list at least here. After that, there are a lot school based leagues that involve FED Rules being played under. And I am sure that applies on some level to other areas of the country. Again just this little issue is why it will not happen. I did not have to read your post or read every word slowly in your post to understand that basic fact. And I am not actually arguing with you, I am sharing a perspective on the topic. Not every response is an argument. We are not going to solve this issue on this site anytime soon. I doubt the NF reads this and says, "You know, Jeff Rutledge said this on that website, so let us listen to what he thinks and throw out all of our general and basic principles we have been applying for years." Pop Warner and Bill George (Youth Football) here are about the biggest youth football organizations outside of actual school ball uses FED Rules for all there levels considering they are across the country. Heck everyone wants to be different I would suspect and that is part of the issue. They do not care what officials think IMO.

Considering that the FED is bigger than just one sport, they tend to share their philosophies across multiple sports and sports we never have discussed here. And this all started as to why we do or do not discuss football on this site, which honestly has little to do with what rules set is used overall. There are many more venues for discussion of football and this site has been left in the dust for some time. Basketball for example has the largest following but most of the participants seem to follow other sites as well. Stop being so sensitive, just having a discussion man. That is what we are supposed to be doing here right?

Peace

Then stop attributing to me things I'm not saying and actually saying the opposite of.

I'm not talking about Naperville, IL, I'm talking about the entire country. Those are the largest youth baseball organizations from coast to coast. Regardless it was simply an example to refute something you were claiming that wasn't true.

As am I and from somebody that has a pretty unique experience in this topic. My only point was that a lot of the things claimed about lower levels playing under NCAA rules are not true. I've experienced it firsthand. That's it.

And since I have to seemingly say it over and over again, I'm not advocating and I'm not saying it even makes sense for other states to change. It just wouldn't be the end of the known world if they did.

Sure. Whatever helps you sleep at night. :)


I'm fine. Not heated or being sensitive at all. It's not too much to ask that my posts actually be understood though. Of course it's a discussion otherwise I wouldn't be engaging in it. And then whose posts would you only partially read? ;)

I rarely if ever work a game in Naperville, Illinois. Nothing I was talking about has anything to do with the town I live in. And I do not do baseball anymore and I never did a couple of the organizations games as you listed. I can only speak for what I know and what I did. I also did high school baseball in Iowa and those leagues you mentioned were not as big of an influence in youth baseball because those kids played high school during the summer.

I was just giving a perspective. Take it or leave it. Again, the NF is not doing something either way based on what we talk about here.

There are a lot of things that help me sleep at night and it does not involve talking to a dude on an internet site. But thanks for the concern. ;)


For something to be understood it falls on you first. I was just commenting on the topic and not trying to make it conversation. But I have seen this movie before where people from Texas claim that everything they do is so great and everyone else should follow because it is not a problem there. Again, just giving a perspective of why that might not work for everyone. I also played football in Texas for a brief time and had another family member play there and get a D1 scholarship. I am very aware of how different Texas approaches youth football and other sports to where I have lived and officiated. Unless it has drastically changed, those issues would not go away.

Peace

I don't think it's a great analogy to say that many youth baseball leagues use OBR so why not use NCAA for sub-college HS. In my opinion, there is far more commonality in the main playing rules from OBR to FED in baseball than NCAA to FED in football. For the vast majority of plays, there is no substantial difference in baseball. The main differences that come up are the balk rules and obstruction, but it's pretty rare for a balk call in OBR to actually get pitched and hit, and obstruction/interference differences simply don't come up all that often. If I see more than 5 a year, it's a lot.

In football, it's a totally different story. From blocking below the waist to all the exceptions to clock management, etc., the differences are pervasive and commonplace. I think it's unreasonable to expect the vast army of officials across the country - of all different experience levels and abilities - to master the NCAA code. I understand it works in TX, with a - shall we say - unique and more intense culture. And MA is a relatively small state that may find it easier to ensure uniformity and knowledge. I don't think it would work across the board.

As an aside, here in central Ohio, it's virtually unheard of to have any baseball at any level that isn't Fed. The only league I know that uses OBR is the adult league, and even they use the Fed FSPR.

Two, tried and true old sayings come to mind; 1. "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" and 2. "When in Rome, act like a Roman".

I have lived and umpired in 6 states. An overwhelming majority of youth baseball is played under some OBR-based rules set. This is not the argument to make here.

I did not bring up OBR, so honestly what baseball does in relationship to this conversation is silly if you ask me. Not sure what argument you are talking about. OBR does not have the vast differences that NFL does to even college ball in rules.

Peace

Exactly.

Peace

Please understand folks, this is one person's opinion.

I understood that point, but that factor is unimportant when you compare it to the number of people playing by Fed rules. No matter how motivated professional coaches are, they're not going to do as thorough a job finding loopholes as the sheer mass of numbers is. How else could you explain how many years it took for them to find that absolutely gaping loophole in NCAA rules that allowed a backward pass to be batted forward for recovery inbounds to gain yardage?

Partly that's for historic reasons. The pros invented baseball as we know it, so all the codes are derived from OBR. Football as we know it was invented by the colleges -- students & alumni. Basketball was invented by the YMCA. Soccer was imported intact.

Of those, football's rules have always been the most contentious & turbulent, so you'd expect a lot of diversity. The pros honed baseball's rules and developed such a following that theirs became everybody's model. Basketball was almost proprietary in its early development, so they too got out most of the kinks. Soccer is played internationally, so it's going to conform pretty closely, plus it's simple enough that there's not much that would reasonably vary.

Softball has so much rules variation, even though it's on a baseball model, because it has such wide particip'n by people who are into it to varying degrees. That's how it's developed specialties like 16".

If you look at many NCAA rules changes (even the NFL), many of the changes were directly because of loopholes that needed to be closed because coaches were on the edge or going over the line of things that could apply to the game. Many of those rules do not translate or are not problems at the high school level as an example because coaches are not pushing the envelope that much if at all. Like the substitution rule were the defense has an opportunity to match subs under NCAA Rules. No such rule exists in NF code because it is not really needed. Also no forward fumble rule either in NF. Again I do not think coaches have time to get that cute at the high school level because you will simply outfox yourself instead of your opponent.

Peace

Even predictably more frustrating is trying to outfox the Referee of the game you're playing. If you're successful, it's not likely to gain anything.

Coaches use this all the time in Texas. 3 or 4 years ago, when I had the pregame conversation with a coach, the first thing he said was that "we run up tempo and snap the ball when its down since we don't sub." That was fine, although they didn't run THAT up tempo and snaps were often well after the ball was put down. Anyway, we let defensive illegal substitution fouls go in the very last series (game was out of hand) because we didn't want to stop the clock, but it was clear the strategy worked.

If you considered only the coaches of children's football being played under Fed rules, you'd see a lot more pushing of the envelope than you ever see in college. For instance, that was the primary place for the development of "not ready" tactics that both Fed & NCAA then saw necessary to legislate specifically against. I don't know what impelled Fed to legislate against 2 forward passes in a down, but I bet it started with children's football. If these things stayed confined to children's play, Fed would see no need, but they percolate up to HS level.

I am not talking about just pushing an envelope, I am talking about having enough time and energy to know the current rules and find a loophole. Most coaches are not going to do that very well unless they have nothing else better to do than just coach. Youth coaches do not make a living only on coaching.

Peace

Then you'd be surprised at the proportion of advances in many fields that are made by amateurs.

But even if you don't count the amateurs, most of the tactical advances in football that came to be popular in college and/or the pros debuted in high school. It's an enormous laboratory out there. And among those who straddle a fence, some try things out in the lower-stakes field before trying it in the higher-stakes one. For instance I knew of a couple HS coaches who'd experiment with stuff in women's football.