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Originally Posted by rubecube
Whoever said that was either being facetious or ######ed. I would almost venture to say that the lower-scoring games in the NFL have less to do with the size of the field, and more to do with the fact that the defense is closer to the line of scrimmage.
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Well, being right on the line does have a large effect, I'd agree. Especially on short yardage situations - going for a yard is much more dangerous when the defence is between you and that yard, and not merely sitting at it. I do think the narrow field has a big effect on offence, though - the power game becomes very important as a lot of the run has to go through people, whereas on a wide field there is also the option of going around. Not to mention passing is harder when the receivers don't have as much room to get open, especially in the short end zone.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rubecube
One more point to the no-yards rule vs. the fair catch. I think I counted about 6 punts tonight where the returner simply ran up and fell on the ball and got a no yards penalty. How is that more exciting than a fair catch? Not to mention punters in the CFL get penalized for kicking the ball out of bounds. Where's the strategy in that? You can't pin teams deep in their own end in the CFL.
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If the ball bounces, it's only 5 yards so the cover team will often limit the gain by encroaching and ensuring the returner can't run. The trick is to catch it in the air, where the cover team will do just about anything to avoid the 15 yard penalty, which then allows for the chance of a big punt return.
As far as kicking out of bounds and pinning a team goes, you can do it as long as the ball goes out inside the 20, so I don't see your complaint there as valid. This is, again, to leave open the possibility of a big return, as otherwise you could avoid both the chance of a no yards penalty and a return by kicking it out of bounds every time.