Dallas v. Washington
 

Anyone have opinions on the USC called on Dallas late in the 4th quarter last night, where a still standing Redskin receiver who had caught the ball was hit in the shoulder by the defender (and with the defender's shoulder). I know they are to be very careful with head contact and defenseless receivers, and I thought I even heard WH say the word defenseless receiver...

Is there any case where a receiver who has CAUGHT THE BALL and is not yet tackled might be considered a defenseless receiver?

Any other reason anyone can think of that this was flagged (by TWO officials, no less)? I replayed it a few times and cannot see what they thought they saw. Heck, it was not even that good of a hit, and he had a better chance of hurting his TEAMMATE than the receiver.

Got the video, Mike?

Looking right now, actually.

How about this no call?

Laron Landry's Big Hit on Laurent Robinson (MNF 9-26-11) - YouTube

Looks good to me, at any level.

I didn't think it warranted an USC penalty. The defender hit the receiver in the chest with his shoulder. I don't know exactly what the NFL is looking for on these types of plays, it just seems it's getting a little out of hand when you can't hit someone with your shoulder and there is zero helmet-to-helmet contact.

Did Landry lead with his helmet and make contact with his helmet first? I think so. I don't like the walk over the top of him after getting up either but that seems common place in the NFL these days. High school and college I would call it in a second, wouldn't hesitate.

No, he didn't. Shoulder hit.

Good no call.

I paused it at :26 where he dips his head to prepare for contact. Again at :31, it seems that his helmet hits first. Guess I would have flagged it in a game and video review would have supported the call enough for me to not lose sleep.

In the last view in slow motion, he did flex his neck and lower his head just before contact. I would never have seen that full speed, so I could never have called it, but it is the rxn we don't want players to have to impending contact.

Looks like IHC to me, too!

LOL!!

I agree that full speed makes it very difficult but anytime that head dips my hand goes to the flag and I let it process. If my hand ever goes to my flag, I normally throw it on plays like this. KCI, Spearing, Horse Collar, etc... I default to protecting the players. If we saw more flags for leading with the helmet/dipping the helmet, including against the ball carrier, we would probably see less plays like this. Ever since we put an emphasis on the horse collar tackle, I have seen the number of those offenses go down.

.02

Agree, and I would say it's clearly legal (not borderline).

Those of you who think this play is IHC seem not to know what "initiating contact with the helmet" means or how this foul is to be called. The tackler led with his shoulder, and even if the helmet arrives a microsecond earlier it's not a foul.

To be a foul, the IHC must be obvious, not borderline. To be obvious, it must involve no or minimal contact with the shoulder.

I agree wholeheartdly...the Landry hit was clearly legal.

NFL Rules Book (2011)

Rule 12, Section 2, Article 9

(b) Prohibited contact against a player who is in a defenseless posture is:

(1) Forcibly hitting the defenseless player’s head or neck area with the helmet, facemask, forearm, or shoulder, regardless of whether the defensive player also uses his arms to tackle the defenseless player by encircling or grasping him; and

(2) Lowering the head and making forcible contact with the top/crown or forehead/”hairline” parts of the helmet against any part of the defenseless player’s body.

Note: The provisions of (2) do not prohibit incidental contact by the mask or helmet in the course of a conventional tackle on an opponent

Based on that, it seems that it fits perfectly into part 2, unless you feel it was incidental. Did the crown or forehead hit the defenseless player's body? He lowered his head, and made forcible contact with the crown/forehead part of his helmet. Thanks for the rule clarity. His arms and shoulders following through were incidental to the helmet contact, imho.

I can conclude only that we're looking at different films. In the film I saw, the crown/forehead of the tackler's helmet never touched the receiver, much less initiated the contact. :shrug:

You are correct we are. I am talking about the Landry hit. This thread jumped ship and I rode that one. My bad, I haven't seen the USC that was called which the OP referenced. The Landry one has the link in the thread. His helmet hits the middle of the Dallas receivers chest at :23.

I think what made it look worse at full speed was the receivers head jerking back. At full speed it would appear that it was helmet to helmet. Obviously after seeing the replay it looked like a good legal hit to me.

Just for clarification sake, the play referred to in the OP was a personal foul rather than unsportsmanlike conduct.

Try pausing the Landry hit on Laurent Robinson at :30 to :31. If you don't see him dropping his head and making contact with the top/forehead/crown, then we are watching different plays. This is bang-bang IHC, no option for slow-mo during the game but I default to safety when in doubt. The endzone angle gives a good view around :23 showing him dropping his head. The flag from me is to protect Landry in the future more than it is to protect Robinson, imho.

So you're OK with penalizing fouls that don't happen. Nice to hear that.

Nice to hear that you can't handle someone that disagrees with you on a point, so you resort to making a statement like that. I actually only penalize fouls that don't happen. That's what got me where I am today.:D

So, you can say with such utter matter of factness that a foul didn't occur? That a competent jury of seven officials couldn't find reasonable doubt that a foul occurred. I am not an NFL official but as I stated earlier, this would have warranted a flag for me in college and high school. The college rule reads something like "when in doubt, it is a foul."

I would say agree to disagree but I guess by your statement above that won't work for you. So, you are right. He didn't drop his head and hit a defenseless receiver with the crown/top/forehead of his helmet. Mercy, I give!

His forearms and shoulder clearly hit first. The following contact with the helmet is not illegal.

Besides that, pausing it means nothing. There isn't a call a football official can make where he gets to pause the play.

Once again we are probably looking at different plays. So, are you saying that the helmet contact is incidental? If so, then good call on your part because that is how the rule reads. I believe it was not incidental. Also, I agree and stated earlier that there is no slo-mo on the field and we have to go with our gut. My gut has a flag and your gut doesn't. It's all good, I can be civil when people disagree with me. Heck, coaches disagree often but I haven't let that get in the way of me getting to where I am now. :)

Dont really have a position on the PF's, crew to crew in my opinion the NFL is somewhat inconsistent and it is frustrating to fans. Its very difficult at the speed these guys play at to rule on some of these hits so I feel for them. Late hits on the quarterback they have changed the rules and still have tons of qb's getting hurt and in my opinon are inconsistent in their rulings.

but watching this game I could not believe this crew missed the hold on Demarcus Ware near the end of the game, it was on the blatantly obvious side..... a first year pop warner should not have missed that. Jon Gruden went ballistic and they showed the replay as Ware was on a path to destroy Grossman.

Also another thing from this game that was interesting as Dallas came back and blamed all the early snaps their center kept making was due to a former Dallas player on Washingtons D line was calling out Romo's cadence. Interesting I guess it would be nearly impossible for the U to hear since he is behind the O line except for the last 5 minutes of the half?

Even when he's on the defensive side of the ball he can't always determine how says what. There is a lot of noise with different players yelling out different calls. You may hear someone yell "go" but you can't always tell which player did it.

Having been on the field, and then watched my own game on film enough, I am fully aware (as you should be) that often times, holding or no holding is all about angle. What is blatantly "pop-warner" obvious on film is not necessarily that obvious from the angle that the official has. Gruden doesn't know that, but we do. Even the fanboy in me doesn't get bent out of shape when my team doesn't get a call like the Ware one.

Calling phantom 15-yarders? Not acceptable from any angle... you have to SEE this to call it. Hard to see it, from any angle, when it doesn't actually happen. Calling the player a defenseless receiver when announcing the foul irritated me even more, given that the receiver in question CAUGHT THE EFFING BALL. Take it a step further and make this bad call against my team at a critical moment...? Yeah, I was throwing pillows at the TV. :)