Quote:
Originally Posted by rubecube
Absolutely. My post was directed at the guy who said that NFL returners used the fair catch because they were too scared to run with the ball.
Why in god's name would a CFL player let a ball bounce? I've never seen a CFL player stay back and let the ball bounce. Most of the time I see them run and fall on the ball to catch the coverage team in the no-yards zone.
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Admittedly, if they can get to the ball, they almost always will try to catch it, but they don't necessarily get to every ball to be able to catch it.
Theoretically, you could let a ball bounce to fake out the cover team, to get them into the five yard circle when you do touch the ball.
I do like the no yards rule a lot better then the fair catch rule, especially when all the other strategic options come into play. If I was in control though, I'd probably modify the rule somehow, especially for when the ball has already hit the ground. The point is to protect players from getting run over the moment they touch the ball; penalizing a player who is standing (not running towards the returner) 4 yards from where the ball is touched is not doing anything to protect the returner. I've often thought that it would be acceptable for the cover team, when the ball has already touched the ground (turning the penalty from 15 yards to 5 yards) to actually come and stand about 2 yards away from the ball, just to make sure that the returner only gets the 5 penalty yards on the return, and nothing more. You might be able to do away with the no yards penalty once the ball bounces, as then, the returner has the option to not touch the ball if someone is flying towards him, and he's not looking up into the sky, so he can see guys coming at him.