NCAA Rules Book, Part II, Officiating Standards, Section 2, item 11:
“The snapper shall not be permitted to move the ball more than 1/2 yard forward when taking his stance nor allow the ball to be moved over the line to gain or goal line. The play shall be shutdown, the ball reset, and the player and the coach warned. A foul for a False Start shall be considered after a warning.”
IMHO, this is the worst and most unnecessary playing rules policy ever instituted by the NCAA. There is absolutely no necessity for the snapper to move the ball forward ANY amount. If the snapper can’t figure out how to take his stance while leaving the ball exactly in position between the goal lines, his team needs to find another snapper. When we’d see this happen before this policy was added to the Standards, it was very easy and effective, after the first instance in a game, to simply tell the snapper not to move the ball forward while taking his stance and/or adjusting the ball, and, if he does it again, an illegal snap would be called. After that conversation, we never - repeat - NEVER had a problem with the snapper moving the ball forward afterward. I hear the argument, “Well, this doesn’t happen early in a game; it happens in critical situations, and a warning is too late.” Easy enough. Make the illegal snap call, without warning. That will stop it, appropriately serving the game of football.
Instead, they put this stupid ‘standard’ in place, creating yet another unnecessary judgment for us to make, for which we’ll get criticized, regardless of what we do. Make a call: Oh, you’re being too officious! Let them move the ball: You let ‘em improve their field position, and they got a first down!
Completely unneeded policy.
