The question to be asked is: Was the contact avoidable? The vast majority are. Players (undoubtedly coached) think they have a right to contact a ball carrier on the ground. A feet-first sliding ball carrier is just a special case of a ball carrier who is down. The only difference is that, in the case of the feet-first sliding ball carrier, the ball is dead as soon as the ball carrier drops his butt to begin the slide. In other cases, the BC needs to have a body part other than a hand or foot make contact with the ground or something out of bounds for the ball to become dead. In the case of a sliding BC, that slide (and dead ball) begins soon enough that he should almost never be contacted. Pursuers should be able to avoid contact with him. Even in other cases of ball carriers being ‘down,’ quite often the contact is unnecessary, but is usually just a case of the defender falling on the BC, with no major impact. But, we are seeing more and cases where the defender doesn’t just fall on the BC. He then proceeds to ‘rough up’ the BC, push up off the BC, push them in the head, etc. If the defender could clearly avoid contact with the BC, this needs to be called. “Extra curricular” actions need to be called.
