Rules questions
 

1. High school game. Defense recovers a fumble, and is returning for a TD. I didn't see what happened, but the offense was flagged for 3 personel fouls on the return. I don't exactly recall what the white hat said, but I believe he used the term, targeting a defenseless player. I think the fouls were about 35 or 40 yards from the goal line behind the player running with the football.

The fouls were enforced on the kickoff, and the kickoff was from the returning teams 15 yard line. Since there has to be a 10 yard "buffer zone", the returning team was behind their 5 yard line.

My real question is what would happen if there and been 4 personel fouls, and the ball would have spotted athe 7 1/2 yard line (?), and there wouldn't be an actual 10 yard "buffer zone".

2. Duplicate numbers in NCAA game. I have seen duplicate numbers in NCAA games, and I know they can't be on the field at the same time. Last year watching a UTexas game they had 3 players wearing #19. A tight end, kicker, and some guy that had headphones on, and looked like he was probably way down the depth chart. My question is what is the actual rule about duplicate numbers.

These are just curiousity questions as I've never seen or heard of the two situations.

1. You would go half the distance to the goal on each penalty if necessary.

2. You just stated what the basics of the rule is. They cannot be on the field at the same time. Think about it this way, D1 teams can have 85 scholarships each year. With possible retired numbers and considering that most cannot be on the field at the same time with an offensive and defensive player.

Peace

shouldn't mater if there were 3, 4, or 10 if they all occurred during the return they are all live ball and you can only accept 1 of them. However the point is valid had they been dead ball. Not sure interesting question.

The receiving team's restraining line is always 10 yds. from the kicking team's, even if that puts it in their end zone. Fortunately you have that 10 yd. chain you can use as a visual aid.

Only one live ball foul penalty could be accepted. Additional unsportsmanlike conduct could be penalized those are non-contact fouls. Dead ball fouls could also be assessed.

Yes, it's illegal to hit a player that far behind the ball who is obviously out of the play.

They would have to be 2 1/2 yards deep in the end zone.

Well there is one personal foul that is enforced from the succeeding spot (9-4-8) so it might matter if it takes place during a live ball.

I probably should have made that clearer, but that is a possibility to accept more than one PF during a live ball.

Peace

Okay maybe another piece to the puzzle. The kicking team does the onside kick (which did take place) from the 7 1/2 yard line. If the returning team falls on the ball in the end zone is that a safety, or a touchback. I was thinking you couldn't return kicks from the end zone in FED anymore.

I guess the fouls were all dead ball since they all were enforced on the kickoff. I was leaving at the same time the officials were walking to their dressing room. I would have walked over, and asked them, but they had a policeman escorting them. Figured it wouldn't be prudent.

This was a Texas HS game wasn't it? If so, we play under NCAA rules here. A kick can be returned from the end zone. If the ball was not touched by the receiving team before it hit the ground in the end zone, the ball is dead and it is a touch back.

If the ball was touched before hitting the ground in the end zone, then it is live and the kicking team can recover for a TD. If the receiving team recovers in the end zone it is a touchback since the kick is what put the ball in the end zone.

You can only accept 1 live ball foul weather its a PF or not, but there is the case on the scoring play where it is assessed on the kick off but still still you can only give them 1 unless you call them dead ball

Would they really have to be 2.5 yards deep in the end zone? By rule as soon as the ball crosses the goal line its a touchback so why would they be required to be 10 yards off the ball in this case? Hopefully if this scenario ever occurred the receiving team coach would have his players back in the end zone and just let the ball become dead on the kick. Of course if I'm the K team coach I would instruct my kicker to kick the ball as soft as possible so as to avoid a touchback.

That's the best thing to do. Tap it off the tee and have K pick the ball up.

Because they have to be, by rule.NCAA Rules, it's dead if it hits the ground first in the EZ - agree on R's players - I'd get everyone back. K can't catch it on the fly as long as an R player is nearby.

We had one, oh, 7 years ago, where the kickoff was from the 25. And then it was kicked out of bounds at about the 10. Made for a fun discussion here regarding where to spot the ball.

That's fun. No 30 yard placement possible so 5 yards and rekick or 5 yard tack on would be the two options.

That does not apply to the contacting someone in the restricted area and it is not a spot foul, it is a succeeding spot foul. If there was a PF also during a live ball, then you could have both. ;)

Peace

It's not really clear. Both NCAA & Fed treat kicking out of bounds as a foul, and list the option of R scrimmaging a fixed distance from the previous spot alongisde possible penalties, but write that clause in such a way as to cast doubt that it's a distance penalty. (We had someone here recently invoke the "fundamental" that there are only 5-, 10-, and 15-yd. penalties.) Nevertheless, I think this should be treated as a previous spot penalty enforcement option, and therefore half the distance whenever that'd be less than the distance otherwise specified. That consider'n would (heh) kick in anywhere inside the 50 in Fed, and anywhere outside K's 40 in NCAA.

Luckily, none of this opinion is in the rules.

The "take the ball 30 yards from the kick" is not a penalty walk off - it's an option of where you want to take possession designed to prevent constant re-kicks on deep out of bounds kickoffs. Without this option, R's only real option when a kick went OOB at the 5 is to make them rekick.

But it isn't.

But you can't blame me for construing the 25/30 yds. from the spot provision as a penalty, when so many of you say that Fed's "additional 15 yards" in the intentional PI provisions is a penalty -- and indeed that is the way the latter is being administered. In each case the rules writers (I guess the buck stops with the editor) have, in the middle of a passage giving penalties, stuck another type of enforcement, but you're saying that in one case (Fed PI) they mean it to be a penalty (in that case a 2nd penalty enforced after the 1st), but in the other (Fed & NCAA re free kick to out of bounds) you're saying it's an enforcement option which is not to be construed as a penalty.

There are ways the language of each of these could be cleaned up to conform to the meaning that's apparently been passed down thru the officials' grapevine.

What were the other people arguing for in the case of mbcrowder's "fun discussion"?

[FED] It's not a distance penalty, since it's not marked off from one of the enforcement spots. It's an option for R, just like taking the ball where it goes OOB is.

It was "fun" on the field. I think everyone here was nearly unanimous. The awarded spot is just that - an awarded spot, not a penalty (and no, I don't "blame you" for not knowing that). More analogous to a touchback's awarded spot than a penalty - with the obvious exception that this is not a fixed yard line but rather a distance from the kick.

So in that case, if it's kicked on/inside the 25, the ball would be "spotted" in the EZ, and therefore a touchback?
Is the rule intended to make it such that the ball is considered to have gone OOB at that spot?

No, it is simply not an option. They have to take the ball where it went out or enforce the 5 yard penalty and rekick. Same in NCAA however the receiving team also has the option of tacking on 5 from where it went out.

You say it's not a penalty, but it's given as a choice of spot after the play is flagged, so it sure seems to act like a penalty. It seems to fit Fed's 2-16-5 and 2-16-1 definitions, and similarly NCAA's 2-20. Do you signal "penalty declined" when this option is chosen?

No, because declining the penalty would leave the ball at the OOB spot. (That happens sometimes after an attempted on-side kick that goes OOB.)

When R chooses the 25-yard option, I give the signal, then point to the spot where the ball will be placed.

So when that option is chosen, a penalty is neither accepted, nor declined, nor canceled as part of a double foul situation. Meanwhile in NCAA, the same procedure seems to leave a penalty incomplete according to 10-1-1(a).

It would seem that to satisfy the administrative procedures in both codes, the penalties offered must be declined (or be signaled as canceled by the choice), so that this non-penalty may be chosen and enforcement following the foul completed.

The foul for free kick out of bounds can offset another live ball foul.

Incorrect. Declining this penalty means the ball goes to the spot that it went out of bounds. Accepting this penalty gives the receiving team two options (usually), one of which is taking the ball 30 (or 25) yards from the spot of the kick.

Then you're saying either option is a penalty. In that case, why doesn't the option specified above act like a distance penalty in terms of half-the-distance restriction? It's specified as a distance from a spot, isn't it?

Is the problem that the distance is specified toward the offended team's goal line rather than the offending team's (Fed 10-1-5, NCAA 10-2-6)? In that case, why deprive the offended team of an option? If the enforcement of that choice would put the ball on or behind their goal line, offer them a touchback.

Yes. Two bad teams, but a very exciting game. Losing team came back from a 33-0 score just a little into the 2nd quarter. Losing team missed making a touchdown from the 1 yard line on the last play of the game. 2 point conversion would have tied it. Final score: Grand Prairie 53 Irving 45.

You seem to be hung up on signals, Robert. Were you a traffic cop in a past life?

Not sure what your motivation is for making this difficult. I'm not going to get into what it should be - because frankly it's fine the way it is and this happens so rarely.

I don't know what "either option is a penalty" means.

The PENALTY is "kick out of bounds". All 3 (or 2) options are enforcement options. Two of those 3 are not distance penalties. This is truly simple.

OK, let's be technical. The FOUL is "free kick out of bounds". The PENALTY is one of the three choices, although a case could be made that taking the kick at the inbounds spot is really the receiving team declining the penalty. It's not listed that way, so let's say it's 3 choices.

Edited to add: I've always been taught (and this is backed up in the Redding guides and in NFHS case 6.1.8H) that if you can't enforce the distance penalty (25 yards in NFHS football), the option cannot be given. Period.

OK, I stand corrected - and get Robert's post now. My apologies Robert. Still don't see why this is a big deal.

It's a big deal any time you need a case book, or the grape vine, to clarify something the rules state. It would be very easy for them to write this into the rules. In the meantime there's nothing in the rules themselves to justify that way of settling it (i.e. choice is off the table) rather than the touchback option I worked out above.

Meanwhile I found an obscure little provision that applies to the original question: NCAA 10-2-5(f): "Distance penalties for fouls by either team may not extend a team’s free kick restraining line behind its five-yard line. Penalties that would otherwise place the free kick restraining line behind a team’s five-yard line are enforced from the next succeeding spot." Funny word there, "extend"; maybe should be "result in" or "place" or "put" or the like. "Extend" there doesn't conform with other use of "extended" in their rules in the context of lines, planes, and zones. Actually the entire 1st sentence is made nearly (or arguably entirely) superfluous by the 2nd.

But doesn't it make sense that every penalty can be declined? (Not accounting for strategic reasons to never decline some fouls.)

If the answer to my question is yes, the I submit that declining the foul for a KO OOB gives the receiving team it's worst option: which is where the ball went OB if behind the KO line + 25y.

Actually I think the casebook is the most important book and tell us actually how to apply rules. I do more reading of the casebook than any other book in most of the sports I work for that very reason.

Peace

I see that as a bug, not a feature.

Well you do not officiate, so I would not expect you to see it my way. Put yourself in our shoes and you will realize that most of what we do is apply rules in a practical way.

Peace

Well, Bobby --- if the rulebook was filled up with the caseplays, examples, and commentary we get from other guides, it would be exceedingly long. The rulebook states the rules as concisely as possible while trying to be clear. Given that they are not perfect, and many words have multiple meanings, the casebooks are extremely helpful in showing us the intent of the rules. The casebooks are not a liability - they help us rule as consistently as possible. Without them, insane internet wordsmiths (I can think of three) would continually pick apart the rulebook looking for obscure situations and using odd interpretations of different words' definitions.

Unfortunately, even though the casebook exists and tells us in just about any case how to rule - those insane internet wordsmiths still exist, resulting in threads like this one (and more than half of the active threads going right now).

As one of my white hats says in pre-game- "You gotta gun, use it"
Actually I have found the ignore poster feature to be a useful tool.

A tool sadly not appropriate for moderators... :)

I don't know about exceedingly; NCAA put their interpretations in the book many years ago (appended at the end) and so did NFL (interpolated).

Wait are we (well really not we) now trying to argue the value of a case book? Really?! :confused:

But that's the problem. The more valuable a casebook is, the more it points to problems with the rule book.

There's nothing wrong with mnemonics, restatements of rules, or examples being given when working thru the rules requires multiple steps that can cause one to stumble; you see that sort of thng in any math textbook, for instance. What's wrong is when different readers (or even a single reader with a mind to it) can start with a single rule book and follow every possible step thru it and wind up with different answers. If a case book in that case is acknowledged to be correct, the next edition of the rule book should be rewritten to conform to that fact. If anybody who's concerned with the game comes up with a different answer from anybody else, and the only way to say who's correct (because they both give their reasons) is whatever has come thru the grapevine as "the way it's done", then the rules have failed in that particular.

And the NCAA uses video and many other forms of items to give their interpretations. They do not need a big casebook, but the NCAA does have a casebook in multiple sports just like the NF. So it is really not a very good comparison when the NCAA puts out actual videos every year and weekly information to dictate how things should be handled. The NF does not have that kind of resources to do such a thing or rely that every official would see their interpretations like the NCAA can.

Peace