Onside kick with first touching and a foul

[bossman72]

Ok I finally see what y'all are getting at with the rule wording..... 


What about 6-1-7   "R can take the ball at spot of first touching...... or may choose to put the ball in play as determined by the action which follows first touching."  If K downs the ball before it goes 10 yards, it's R's ball there at the dead ball spot.  It's also a spot of first touching, but for R's purposes for this case play they enforce from dead ball spot.  The action that followed first touching is a dead ball after a free kick that didn't travel 10 yards.

Well personally, I would fix 6-1-6 instead of 6-1-7 (I didn't quote the right rule number in previous posts).
Something like...

"If any K player recovers or catches a free kick, the ball becomes dead.  It belongs to him unless it is kick-catching interference and R chooses an awarded fair catch or unless the kick is recovered before it crosses R's free-kick line untouched by an R player.  (etc...)"

The "it is first touching" is deleted and encompassed by 6-1-7 to avoid confusion.

[Fatso]

Well personally, I would fix 6-1-6 instead of 6-1-7 (I didn't quote the right rule number in previous posts).
Something like...

"If any K player recovers or catches a free kick, the ball becomes dead.  It belongs to him unless it is kick-catching interference and R chooses an awarded fair catch or unless the kick is recovered before it crosses R's free-kick line untouched by an R player.  (etc...)"

The "it is first touching" is deleted and encompassed by 6-1-7 to avoid confusion.

Yep, sounds good to me.

[NVFOA_Ump]

Ok I finally see what y'all are getting at with the rule wording..... 


What about 6-1-7   "R can take the ball at spot of first touching...... or may choose to put the ball in play as determined by the action which follows first touching."  If K downs the ball before it goes 10 yards, it's R's ball there at the dead ball spot.  It's also a spot of first touching, but for R's purposes for this case play they enforce from dead ball spot.  The action that followed first touching is a dead ball after a free kick that didn't travel 10 yards.

But per the garbled changes from last year this is a loose ball play, no?  Loose ball play penalty enforcement is from the previous spot, no?  We can all agree that the rule needs serious attention but the only result that I see here is that R takes the ball at the DB spot, the 49.5, declines the LB ball foul and accepts the DB foul.

[Fatso]

But per the garbled changes from last year this is a loose ball play, no?  Loose ball play penalty enforcement is from the previous spot, no?  We can all agree that the rule needs serious attention but the only result that I see here is that R takes the ball at the DB spot, the 49.5, declines the LB ball foul and accepts the DB foul.

It's a loose ball play but it's a kick so there's the tack-on option which doesn't exist for other loose ball plays. 

[NVFOA_Ump]

See that's the crux of the rule wording that's a problem.  (Let's ignore the first touch at the 49 for a minute). The way it reads today (and in the past), team R only gets the ball because K's recovery at the 49.5 is a first touching violation.  Therefore if you accept the illegal block, the first touching goes away and it's enforced at the previous spot.  When they made the tack-on rule, it didn't account for this.

We need an editorial change to clarify that the recovery at the 49.5 makes the ball belong to R since it did not go 10 yards.

But R would never accept the Illegal Block foul in this case play.  R would take the ball at the dead ball spot, the 49.5, decline the K live ball, loose ball foul, and then accept the DB foul against K.  R's ball 1st & 10 at the K 34-1/2 yard line.

[bossman72]

But R would never accept the Illegal Block foul in this case play.  R would take the ball at the dead ball spot, the 49.5, decline the K live ball, loose ball foul, and then accept the DB foul against K.  R's ball 1st & 10 at the K 34-1/2 yard line.

That's what I'm saying.

If the editorial change existed to show that R is in legal possession at the end of the down, then you can accept it as a tack on and also accept the UNS foul.

Today, it has to be declined to keep the ball.

[SJohnson]

Just a big thank you for the discussion and explanations. I just re-read 6.1.6, 61.7 and 10.4.2. Exception with new context that I would have never understood without you all.

[Ted T]

R can't "decline" that. R's ball at the spot of first touching is not a penalty enforced for a foul, it's the result of the play (possibly oversimplified).

This is similar to a punt that K picks up beyond the LOS at the R25 (untouched by R). R can't "decline" the first touching and just give K the ball.

As for the whole scenario with penalties:

There are actually three options in this scenario, the two you mentioned and the one they severely botched at applying.

The result of the play is R's ball at the spot of first touching, K49.

R can decline the illegal block penalty and take the ball at the K49, +15 yard to the K34 for the UNS.
R can accept the illegal block penalty, enforcing from the previous spot and replay the kick. K rekicks from the K15 (-10 for block, -15 for UNS).
R can accept the illegal block penalty, enforcing from the spot of first touching, applying the 10-4-2 exception. R's ball at the K24 (+10 for the block, +15 for the UNS)

Technically, they can also decline the unsportsmanlike yardage as well, but that's just getting into absurdity.

I concur with this enforcement.