I'm trying to get this straight--don't know if I gave the ruling.

Scrimmage kick down. R1 gives an invalid fair catch signal while the ball was clearly beyond the neutral zone. R1 muffs the kick, and, while the ball was clearly loose, the BJ sounds his whistle.

My thinking is that the PSK spot is the spot where the kick ended, which in this case is the IW spot. Any words of wisdom out there?

i assume you want NF. We have had this discussion before and if I recall we have had some disagreement. This is not a psk foul. The IW was blown before the kick ended. Therefore you do not have a spot of reference for the ending of the kick. Previous spot, enforce the invalid fair catch signal against R and if K reaches the line to gain, 1st and ten for K. If K does not reach the line to gain, replay fourth down. I am sure when the casebook is printed next year we will have some situations like this to discuss.

REPLY: I agree completely with keystoneref. At the end of the down, i.e. when the IW sounds, K actually has possession of the ball. Therefore, PSK cannot apply. It's got to be treated as a foul during a loose ball play. One more example of the naivety of the PSK myth which claims that "possession changes when the kick crosses the expanded neutral zone." It doesn't!

ok here we go with more PSK wooo hooooooo what would this board be without psk..

2-23-2 A kick ends when a player gains possession or when the becomes dead while not in player possession.

4-2-3j the ball becomes dead when...when an official sounds his whistle inadvertantly.

table 6-4 3 and 4 respectively a kick not recovered by either team belongs to R.

4-2-3 a deals with inadvertant whistles and says during a down or a down in which the penalty is declined.....a legal forward pass or snap in flight, or during a legal kick, the down shall be replayed.


those are the relevant rule references..so we have a down with a penalty, so if K wants to replay the down they have to decline the penalty. If K accepts the penalty for the invalid fair catch then R is in final possession because the ball became dead without being in anyones possession, which we all know belongs to R. So there is PSK available here and if it is available we will penalize from the end of the kick unless the invalid fair catch happened behind the inadvertant whistle spot.

Guys:

Thanks for the replies. The more I think about this, the more I would like to see the NFHS case book for next year. This would be really interesting if it was 4th and 4--without PSK K gets a first down.

I guess I am leaning towards saying PSK does apply. The kick ends when the IW sounds, and I would say the location of the ball at that time would be the spot where the kick ends (i.e. the PSK basic spot). Furthermore, the IW "replay" rules mention a down when a foul is declined; I would say that if a foul is accepted here, then the IW rules would not require an automatic replay of the down. K can then decline the foul and have a replay or have R's foul enforced as a PSK foul with R keeping the ball.

Finally, I think allowing R to keep the ball if the foul is accepted is just the most fair thing to do in this situation. This is also consistent with the intent of PSK, which so many people like to talk about. Look at the 4th and 4 situation mentioned above. If the foul is enforced from the previous spot, you are excessively penalizing R for the BJ's mistake.

CMatthews I still do not agree so tell me what you would do in this situation. 4th and 11 on the 50, K1 kicks the ball from a kick formation and while the ball is in the air R1 pushes in the back at the 30. Almost immediately after the penalty again while the ball is still in the air the BJ has an inadvertant whistle. How are you possibly going to know where the ball was when the whistle blew, so how are you going to have a spot where the kick ends? The NF is going to have to publish casebook plays on these unusual circumstances. It is going to be interesting to see if they adopt the NCAA approved ruling on this type of play, which can be found at http://www.ncaa.org football rules, approved ruling 4-2-1.

If the Fed addresses these situations, I think they will conclude that PSK enforcement does apply, particularly when you consider the philosophy underlying PSK enforcement in the first place.

The basic premise underlying PSK enforcement is that, after making a conscious decision to surrender possession of the ball by a scrimmage kick, the kicking team should not realize the "gift" of a PSK penalty by the receiving team and a possible first down. I think you can see this philosophy at work in the revision of the case play on the NFHS website concerning the double foul scenario (Situation 13). Although the rulebook is ambiguous (as has been thoroughly discussed on all of the boards), this philosophy also is inherent in the requirements that a PSK foul must occur after the kick has crossed the neutral zone and the kick must end beyond the neutral zone. While the kick is behind the neutral zone, the kicking team can advance it and it may not be fair to say that the kicking team made an irrevocable decision to surrender possession of the ball. Therefore, it would be inconsistent with the PSK concept to enforce a penalty occurring after an inadvertant whistle that otherwise meets the PSK requirements against the receiving team from the previous spot and give the kicking team a "windfall." If the kicking team wants to accept the penalty and trump the inadvertant whistle, then enforce from the PSK spot. Otherwise, rekick.

One of the requirements to have PSK enforcement is that R is in posession of the ball when it becomes dead. Since the IW caused the ball to become dead, the ball would still be in K's posession, therfore you cannot have PSK enforcement. Penalize R 5 yards from the previous spot and replay 4th down or award K 1st down if it was 5 or less yards to the line to gain.

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Rule 6-2-7:
"When any scrimmage kick is out of bounds between the goal lines or becomes dead inbounds between the goal lines while no player is in possesson, or inbounds anywhere while opponents are in joint possession, the ball is awarded to R...."

The scrimmage kick becomes dead when the IW occurs, so the ball is awarded to R, and PSK applies. It's no different than if the kick goes out of bounds.

Who gets the choice on replay or not? K. Must not have been R's ball. No PSK.

There is no choice on the replay. The choice is on penalty acceptance. If the penalty is not accepted, the replay is automatic.

The choice is for penalty acceptance, not a replay of the down. If the penalty is declined, the replay is automatice on a loose ball play.

Keystone,
In your situation, unless the IW culprit had a good look at the ball when he sounded it, or anyone else, I would say the end of the kick is where it first touches the ground or a player. I do whole heartedly agree that the federation needs to clarify some of this but, I do believe PSK applies, and I have cited rules that support it...to quote one of the veterans here, can you do the same to dispute it?

REPLY: biglaz...I believe that this rule citation is included to cover the specific situation when a scrimmage kick rolls to a stop and either K touches it, or both teams let it sit there with no one attempting to gain possession. I doubt that the rules editors expected that we would inject an inadvertent whistle into a scrimmage kick scenario that would cause the ball to become dead with no one in possession. In fact, in NF 8-2-1c, they explicitly exclude an IW from the definition of a TD when no player is in possession. My guess (and it's only that--a guess) is that they probably should have done that in 6-2-7 as well.