01Bear said:
BearForceOne said:
I was rewatching the game and was wondering if anybody knows the thinking behind allowing a player other than the returner to call a fair catch.
It almost went unnoticed because BC was lining up at midfield, and I think Wilcox or someone else from the Cal side must have pointed it out to the officials, resulting in the kickoff being reviewed. If true, this deserves a huge shout out, as it was worth a whopping 35 yards of field position and negated a big return!
Just curious why such a rule is in place.
There are often multiple returners. So it's possible that someone who doesn't catch the ball could signal for a fair catch, because he's also a returner (and he may legitimately have thought he was going to catch the ball).
Of course, the kicking team doesn't always know where the ball is going either, so if they key in on the guy who indicated a fair catch, it would allow the receiving team's other returner to get easy additional yards or even a TD. To prevent this, the kicking team would essentially have to ignore fair catch signals and tackle everyone, which could result in serious injuries to an unsuspecting returner. To prevent injuries like this, it makes sense that the rules would make it so if anyone on the receiving team signals a fair catch, the ball cannot be advanced.
Well, I think the kicking team usually knows where the kick will go. But you are right that the receiving team would gain an unfair advantage if a player who is not the returner can indicate a "fake" fair catch signal while the actual returner runs the kick back.
According to the commentators, it is for this reason that if anybody on the receiving team signals a fair catch, they cannot advance the ball.
In this particular instance, it looked like the other returner pointed to the actual returner as if to say "you get it", but in the process, he inadvertently raised his hand above his head, which had to be interpreted as a fair catch signal (even though he was a good 10 yards away from the returner).
Kudos to the person who was paying attention and knew the rules well enough to bring this up to the refs (if in fact this is what prompted the review).
