I just worked a scrimmage and a coach asked me if he's allowed to play a TE with #67. I said absolutely but also made him aware of the eligibility restrictions. He wasn't in love with that answer especially since the same player sometimes plays offensive tackle. I told him his only course of action would be to have that player switch jerseys to an eligible number when he plays TE if he wants him to be eligible. I have seen nothing in the rule book that prohibits the coach from doing this. Anyone disagree?

You are correct
 

You're response to the coach was correct.

Canadian Ruling
 

We have two ways to cover this:

(1) The player can switch numbers from a tackle (40-69) to a TE (1-39, 70-99). There is nothing in the rulebook to not allow this action.

(2) Any player may play any position wearing any number in Canadian football. If they're an eligible pass receiver and they're numbered 40-69, they just have to report to the WH, who will tell the defense. If they're an ineligible pass receiver and they're numbered 1-39 or 70-99, they also have to report to the WH, who will tell the defense. We even have some players who wear "their number" as an O-lineman (for example, #20) and we tell the opposing coach that he's reporting for the whole game.

Anyone here ever watch the CFL? (Besides you Julian?) Just curious.

Re: Canadian Ruling
 

I thought the only thing in Canada was ice, hockey and Molsen. Now you tell me there is a football league. Surely the apocolypse is upon us...;)

In our last association meeting a similar topic was brought up. In that case the question was whether a player could wear a pull-over vest with a different number over his regular jersey and number. The association said that's OK too.

-SW---

I seem to remember that th3 fed a number of years ago said that vests were not legal because they did not meet the requirements for jerserys. I could be wrong.
I think the problem quite was that they worked as tear aways.

Re: Re: Canadian Ruling
 

We also snowboard and ski year-round. :)

But seriously, hockey is very popular here. And actually, as SOON as hockey starts, it gets first coverage on the sports re-cap shows.

The World Cup of Hockey is in full swing and hockey is before everything else on SportsCentre and sportsnetnews. Maybe it's me but I hate that. The weather is great outside. I don't even think about hockey until November at the absolute earliest.

Was this numbering situation part of a subvarsity game? I know some states say the numbering rule can be ignored in subvarsity games as long as both coaches know of the weird numbers on the line.

Varsity. They wanted to know how to go about this for the entire varsity season. We do the same thing for subvarsity which actually is harder to officiate because you need to commit to memory on every play exactly who is eligible. It's more difficult because not only are we asked to ignore the eligible by number requirement, we don't strictly enforce the 50-79 requirement.

Go by the book on Varsity. You might also want to consider reporting the "offending" school to your state association so they're aware of the situation. Maybe if the school hears an admonishment from the state, they'll get their act together.