Read my post above…I enjoyed all the games this past weekend. Didn’t mean to mislead you, while speaking of the last gane. I enjoyed the full slate of week 15.
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I find that knowing what I’m seeing, and being able to read plays as they develop is actually a double edged sword. It makes me really appreciate a well-executed and well-designed play. I revel in those moments of success. But it also makes errors appear more glaring, especially when they involve fundamentals, which should, in theory, be second nature to pro athletes.
Some mistakes are inevitable, but when they are the same mistakes repeated many times without improvement, it makes me ask “what are these guys doing here?”
To draw a parallel, would you hire and keep a cashier who is constantly out of balance on her till and who can’t make change? So why keep a cornerback, for instance, who keeps missing his deep cover assignment, or a lineman who keeps getting roughing penalties or missing key blocks?
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Good answer 
I like the 5 yard no yards penalty on punt returns.
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Are you meaning as in a 5 yard penalty if a kicking team player encroaches the no yards area? If so, I think the penalty is 15 yards.
That is, if a ball has been punted, all players of the kicking team (except the punter) must
be least 5 yards away from the player about to touch the ball.
Yes. In contrast to the NFL where a player must call for a fair catch.
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I agree. I prefer it to the fair catch rule. It used to be that if the 5 yards were encroached upon while the ball was caught in the air it resulted in a 15 yard penalty. If the ball hit the ground first it was only a 5 yard penalty. Opposing coverage team players took advantage of the latter situation and figured, what the hey, sure we’ll get a 5 yard penalty but it’s worth it if we pin the returner deep. Now it’s 15 yards under either circumstance.
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Actually anybody who’s behind the ball when kicked is eligible to go for the ball.
Flags will be thrown but can be picked up if it’s determined that the player or players are onside when the ball is kicked.
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You may right. I had not thought of that. But that would mean a player on the punting team would be standing somewhere behind the punter as the ball is being kicked. Have you seen that happen? Rarely, if ever I should think. They are all up front protecting the ball from being blocked. It may happen more often in kick offs.
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I’ve seen this quite a few times. Even at least once this year, and I haven’t watched even a quarter of the games.
And as a trivial aside, the reason the punter can always recover the ball is because by definition he is always behind the ball when it’s kicked. Same reason an onside kick is legal on a kickoff… all the players are behind the ball (thus the term “onside”, as opposed to being offside) at the time it is kicked.
And yes, I prefer the CFL No Yards rule to the American Fair Catch rule.
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You have seen a punter kick the ball with some of his teammates behind him while kicking the ball? I have watched a lot of football this year and I recall only one time a player on the kicking team recover the ball who was not the punter. I’ll have to watch more closely in future. If you can think of a few games you have seen this let me know. I’d like to check them out.
Can’t recall which game, but one was just a couple of weeks ago. If I recall, it worked, too. Onside player recovered the ball.
I have actually seen two or three attempts this year but haven’t seen every minute of every game so could have missed some. I don’t recall one being recovered however. I remember one or two last year and at least one recovery. It happens but not very often. I wonder if there is a stat for this that can be found?
I remember that game. Not very long ago. And I remember the flag being thrown and taken back. If I recall, a player lined up well behind the punter but to his left. He started running being sure not to be ahead of the ball before it was kicked. This gave him the jump on the opposing team. Play worked very well. I wonder why it isn’t used more often?
I haven’t read this thread yet and I don’t believe that I will ever get through it.
Here’s why I like the CFL so much and also what I think they could improve on:
Pros:
- Fan engagement compared to other Canadian sports
- Higher player engagement with the community
- Pace of play feels faster than other sports such as soccer, golf, hockey
- Big time plays can be viewed from just about anywhere in the stands and don’t require binoculars or super slow-mo
- No pandering to American teams except for that terrible episode of US expansion
Improvements:
- Its hard to deliver a better product when everything is changing all the time. Where do you even start benchmarking? Schedules, salary caps, rules, stats tracking, possible expansion, etc. Stick to a couple things a year, nail them down, move on to the next couple items. Tired of the league being run like a minor league experiment
- Pace is slowed down substantially compared to yesteryear by the refs and coaches challenging. Again, it seems like every year at least a handful of rules are changed
- It would be nice to know what happens in a game during a game, as opposed to post-game speculation. In particular, in regards to what the refs have called. It is bad when the people watching on tv know before the people in the stands, even worse when no one knows
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Nice post. What I’d like to see refs interviewed and asked to explain why certain calls were made. Not sure they would admit mistakes but who knows. . I’d also like to see some refs miked so we can hear what is being said during a ref huddle after a debatable call.
Why wouldn’t the inside recovery be attempted every kick, punt, or kickoff?
I don’t know.
There are a number of reasons, but one of them is when one uses an onside player other than the kicker, there can be diminished kick coverage including when it’s dangerous returner. That onside player has to start several yards behind all the others and behind the kicker at the time of the kick.
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I think that the more often it’s attempted the better the receiving teams would get at noticing that a player or players are lined up onside, so there would be no element of surprise.
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