Is there any ruling on a forward fumble in NF rules? What would happen if A45 has gained 5 yards, B67 attempts a tackle, ball pops out forward of A 45. Can ANYONE on A pick up the ball and advance it or can only A 45? There appeared to be no mention about a forward fumble in the rule book.

If this is true, then a player could fumble a ball forward purposly if he sees a team mate ahead of the play.

There's no rule against it, as long as it truly is a fumble and not an illegal forward pass.

Purposely equals intentionally in my book also...
 

If A intentionally fumbles the ball forward beyond the neutral zone then you have an illegal forward pass. Mark the end of the run with your flag (where A lost possession). If the pass hits the ground the ball is dead. If the pass is caught then you let the play run its course.

The key question is: did A intentionally fumble the ball forward? Tough call, but I can foresee this happening in a game.

Go check out the rule book for definitions of illegal forward passes (rule 2 and rule 7 should contain this). Also go to the end of rule 10 and read the section about the "all but one rule". NF rule book.

Then of course, if you judge the ball was truly fumbled, then any A or B player may catch or recover the loose ball and advance (under NF rules).

[Edited by Mike Simonds on Jul 17th, 2003 at 09:00 PM]

What may help your determination is the quarter/down/distance. If you've got a kid going down 1 or 2 yards short of his line to gain late in a half, he's more apt to try it. Otherwise the cost outweighs the benefit.

This should be in the "Pet Peeves" section. If A fumbles the ball forward any A player can recover the ball and A gets to keep the yardage gained. I believe that this unfairly rewards the offense for a mistake. It actually happened to me, (A long time ago in a galaxy far away). It was 4th and 7. The QB fumbled, short of the line-to-gain, the ball bounced forward about 6 yards, and yours truly recovered for a first down. We scored the go-ahead TD on that posession, won the game,conference and were undefeated. Since I've become an official I've felt a little guilty about that one.

The NCAA has a fourth down fumble rule (returned to the spot of the fumble) but the Fed does not. NFL has one, too as well as a inside 2:00 of the half or 5:00 of the end of 4th qtr. rule.

If you had been in Texas or Massachusetts, your guilt would have been asuaged.

I basically agree with everything said so far. I would only add that I would have to see the play to determine if the fumble was intentional or not. If the player is being tackled by the legs and he is short of the line to gain late in the game and the ball just happens to pop out forward, then I would rule it an illegal forward pass. If it appears a "legitimate" hit coincides with the ball coming out, I would have no foul. I'm thinking in this play if its not clear, I would give benefit of the doubt to the A player and call no foul.

I would not mind seeing a 4th down or late 4th quarter fumble rule in NF to avoid rewarding a team for failure. What I would really like to see is a different rule on fumbles going out of bounds, specifically, that a ball that goes forward and OOB, goes back to the spot of the fumble, and a ball that goes backwards and OOB is put in play at the point it went OOB. Getting credit for fumble that rolls forward and then out is really rewarding a mistake.