What's your ruling?

[Bob M.]

REPLY: OK, the correct answer in 2008 is...game over, go home. It's a rule change that's not really listed as such. It's listed as an editorial change.

Actually, a little history is in order...Last year the Fed changed the wording of this rule. They listed it as an 'editorial' change rather than a rule change. It sounded a bit like they were attempting to make it so that there was no requirement that B's foul must be enforced. A would have the option of declining (like the NCAA rule). However, the wording was so convoluted that you really couldn't tell for sure what the rule was intending. When pushed on it last year, the Fed said that there was no rule change intended (just an editorial change) and that we should handle it the same way we had in the past, i.e. enforce the penalty for B's foul regardless. Now...this season, they changed the wording again, and now it's quite clear that after B decides what he wants to do regarding A's foul, A gets to do the same for B's foul. That's why the answer to the posted play is that the game is over. Clearly, A will decline the penalty and won't allow B to have the untimed down they would get if A had accepted the penalty. No accepted penalties with an expired clock...game over. And, the Fed actually changed a case play (10.2.2 Situation C) to demonstrates that point. However, strangely enough, they still list it as an editorial change when it's anything but editorial. It's a substantive rule change and this play proves it.

As one person pointed out though, if B knows this rule and more importantly could anticipate A's response if he were to decline the penalty for A's motion foul, he might very well accept the penalty for A's motion foul and create a double foul since that's the only way he could squeeze another play out of the game. Otherwise, game over--he loses.