Questions about shifts and motion

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by bsaucer

If team-A lines up into an illegal formation and then shifts to a legal formation prior to the snap, is the play legal?

Every team that huddles does this. Think about it.

If two team-A players shift, and one player stops and becomes set, may the other player continue in sideways (or backward) motion during the snap?

The secret to understanding movements like this is that a shift doesn't end until all the players who were part of the shift at any time come to a stop. Don't think about their individual movements, think about them all together.

One player may be moving sideways in the backfield at the time of the snap, but before that, all shifts had to end for a second. You can't separate out the man in motion from the shift if they overlapped in time. If they were separated by less than a second, then you still didn't have all players stopped for a second.