Forward or Backward Pass?

[stevesmith]

Originally posted by Suudy
Interestingly, we are told by the state not to punch back on backwards passes.

The rationale is that if it is a forward pass that falls incomplete, blow it dead once it hits the ground. If you aren't sure, don't do anything. That way if the wing punches back, but the R blows it dead incomplete, there are no mixed signals to the sidelines ("Hey! The wing said it was backwards, why did you blow the whistle?!?!"). No signal, and no whistle, should be enough to let the players know the ball is still live. [/B]

I agree with this logic. The only time I can think of where this might be an issue is if you have two passes and you need to know that one of them was backwards. But you don't see two passes very often, and when you do, the first pass is usually obviously backward in order to stay as far away from the rushing defense as possible. Given all that, I don't think the "punch" is necessary and can only cause more trouble than good.