We want to kick it
 

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/...boys-coin-toss

The option to kick to start the game should just be removed. If a team really wants to kick in both halfs, they can defer and then confirm before the second half that they actually do want to kick again.

A professional athlete should be able to properly provide the correct answer he desires to the question asked.

A professional coach should be skilled enough to instruct his player what to say.

At the HS level, we fix it 100% of the time to the chagrin of old timers who think this is a perfectly good place to teach life lessons at the expense of the game and crew.


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Jerry Jones probably called the league office to complain...

And what if they defer, and the other team wants to kick off to start the first half?

I thought about this after I posted, and it was a little simplistic, but my point remains. To answer your question, with my original rule change the other team doesn't get that option either. They can choose to receive or defend a goal. That does leave the possibility that this team chooses to defend a goal and now the team that deferred now has to choose to receive. So how's this as a compromise:

The option to kick cannot be selected until after the option of which goal to defend has been chosen.

But...why? Why any of this? Why take away an option, even if these days its application is mostly for a captain to hang his team?

The NFL took away the choice of kicking off by a team that was scored against, but strangely enough they did that in two stages: first abolishing the choice after a touchdown, then some years later after any score. Maybe they thought it more likely a team would want to kick off after having 3 points scored against them. But as far as I know, the other major codes still allow it, and so it is in Canadian football. I could see abolishing that option as saving the 2 seconds it takes to ask the captain, but what's the excuse after a coin toss?

But as long as we're discussing this, I'll add that I think adding the option to defer was a mistake. The funny thing is, years before NCAA adopted it (first major code to do so), I'd come up with the idea and thought it would be an improvement. But since then I've come to think it's a disimprovment -- I mean, why magnify an advantage given by chance? Why, in a game of skill, should the winner of a coin toss thereby earn any more than is necessary? Why should they get to choose which half they get first choice in?

NFHS still allows the team that was scored upon to decide who kicks off, but NCAA does not.

It's actually one of my favorite obscure rules to mention to non-officials. I used to also tell 'em about the "NFHS requires 7 on the LOS, but NCAA requires no more than 4 in the backs" rule difference... alas, NFHS changed that this year.

We actually asked a coach if he wanted to kick off after his team was scored on this year... late in the game, his team was just scored on to cut the lead to 50ish-6... his response was "get the f-ck out of here" (in a good-natured tone). We got a good laugh out of it when we saw him again a few weeks later.


But anyway, a former white hat of mine used to precede the coin toss by telling the captains "Whoever wins, the only options I will accept are 'receive' and 'defer'". Good preventative officiating, IMHO.

Years ago (15 maybe) in a JV game a first year official asked if the coach wanted to kick. The coach called me over I explained the rule and told him it was the first time I had ever heard it asked. We all got a good laugh out of it. I told the rookie to never ask again. If a coach wants to kick (if any really know the rule) they can tell us...

I've seen some youth coaches brag about their teams' prowess in recovering their own free kicks, often well in excess of 50%, yet don't discuss much their prowess in defending against same. If two of those teams met on the field....