NFL to discuss banning “hip-drop” tackle

[Slappy Mc]

Two hand touch with the QBs. So many ways you can't take them down. At some point they have to understand that these are professional athletes getting paid well to play a dangerous sport. Stop making it more difficult for some because you are trying to protect the bottom dollar. If a malicious move is performed, fine throw the flag. These stupid penalties for pushing someone near a sideline or hitting someone too high or too low or landing on the player wrong... GTFOH with that stuff. I signed a waiver when I was 8 years old that told me I could die playing football. If these pros aren't willing to take the same chances, maybe they are in the wrong profession. 

[goldfishwars]

2 hours ago, MWil23 said:

Serious question, and forgive my ignorance...who is giving up yards to perform this move? Can you show a video clip?

Not sure what you’re asking. The lost yardage is in swinging to land on the back of the legs, instead of wrapping the arms around the legs to trap them. I can’t tell you why guys do it, I suspect the trade off is the damage it can cause. It became a big deal in rugby league because it became such a common tactic to take players down, but a spate of injuries later and it’s all but disappeared after it was banned. 

[goldfishwars]

2 hours ago, Jakuvious said:

Would this not make the Adam Vinatieri tackle that @Thomas5737 posted above, that jrry said would obviously be legal (which you then liked, so I assume you agree) illegal? He left his feet to dive for the tackle. He landed on Walker's legs, at least somewhat. If the verbiage is the one sentence you provide there, that it's illegal to have both feet off the ground and land on the back of the runners legs, that's A LOT of unintended now illegal tackles. You need dramatically more specificity than that, and this is the problem everyone arguing against this being illegal sees.

And I don't want to seem like I'm playing dumb here. I know there are ways that the NFL can narrow it down. But they either break existing precedents of establishing intent (the NFL rulebook really doesn't like rules based around what a player is or is not trying to do) or it gets way, way too up for interpretation. And those defending it saying "Oh, it's easy" without then being able to to suggest how it would be (supposedly) easily worded are just missing that.

It’s very different from that clip. A hip drop tackle is where the tackler wraps the opponent, and swings to bring them down by dropping the side/hip on the back of the legs to bring them down rather than trapping them with his arms like Vinateri does here. 

[Jakuvious]

16 minutes ago, goldfishwars said:

It’s very different from that clip. A hip drop tackle is where the tackler wraps the opponent, and swings to bring them down by dropping the side/hip on the back of the legs to bring them down rather than trapping them with his arms like Vinateri does here. 

I know the difference. That is not what I have asked. I'm asking how you distinguish that difference in the NFL rulebook. It is, according to you and Jrry, something very simple that I am asking for, but he has declined to respond at all and you have not answered the actual question. So I'll repeat myself:

Quote

Perhaps it would help if you explained in front of the whole class how you think this rule would be crafted so that it could be narrowly defined.

You said it's easy. So do it. Write the rule that doesn't cause this to be a subjective mess or ban a host of other common ways of tackling ball carriers. Your first response just said leaving their feet and landing on a player's legs. Well, that happens a whole hell of a lot, doesn't it? Like the Vinatieri tackle.

[MWil23]

I’m merely asking for a different definition than the supreme court’s definition of porn, which is that “I know it when I see it”.

[goldfishwars]

4 minutes ago, Jakuvious said:

I know the difference. That is not what I have asked. I'm asking how you distinguish that difference in the NFL rulebook. It is, according to you and Jrry, something very simple that I am asking for, but he has declined to respond at all and you have not answered the actual question. So I'll repeat myself:

You said it's easy. So do it. Write the rule that doesn't cause this to be a subjective mess or ban a host of other common ways of tackling ball carriers. Your first response just said leaving their feet and landing on a player's legs. Well, that happens a whole hell of a lot, doesn't it? Like the Vinatieri tackle.

Dude calm down. I’m not an expert on writing sports law in a manner which can’t be misconstrued, but it’s still easy to recognise a hip drop tackle from one that isn’t. 

Having said that, I still think this is fairly straight forward:

In the process of making a tackle, a defender may not drop his hip or side into the back of an opponent’s legs with the intent to trap them between his body and the ground.

[MWil23]

Just now, goldfishwars said:

Dude calm down. I’m not an expert on writing sports law in a manner which can’t be misconstrued, but it’s still easy to recognise a hip drop tackle from one that isn’t. 

Having said that, I still think this is fairly straight forward:

In the process of making a tackle, a defender may not drop his hip or side into the back of an opponent’s legs with the intent to trap them between his body and the ground.

I think many of us take issue with the “intent” portion and how that will be policed. Just my opinion.

[goldfishwars]

3 minutes ago, MWil23 said:

I think many of us take issue with the “intent” portion and how that will be policed. Just my opinion.

You don’t have to read intent into it. No defender has to drop his hip into a ball carrier’s back legs when bringing him down. The purpose of this type of tackle, is to pin the player’s joints between the ground and the side of their body. It’s dangerous and serves only to cause hurt and injury.

[iknowcool]

I'm in support of banning this or at least finding a way to discourage these kind of tackles.  And how often do these kind of tackles happen per game?  I feel like it wouldn't make playing defense any harder but without any kind of data I really couldn't say for sure.  It doesn't seem like I see these kind of tackles often in the grand scheme of things.

With that said, like people are saying, I could see how implementing this could get tricky.  Especially when I'm sure it will be a 15-yard penalty and automatic first down.  Maybe if they did it like the old facemark penalty.  Something that appeared incidental would be 5 yards, but something that looked intentional and forceful would be 15 yards.  But I can also get why they wouldn't want to involve more referee discretion.  I don't know, tricky situation.  

Edited February 6, 2023 by iknowcool

[Calamity_Cometh]

I can get behind their intent but they need to invest HEAVILY into full time, professional refs if they want to continue to tinker with the rules.

Because I would trust some of you guys who are arguing this and putting thought and effort into it over the ref crews as they are today.

[Thomas5737]

2 hours ago, goldfishwars said:

In the process of making a tackle, a defender may not drop his hip or side into the back of an opponent’s legs with the intent to trap them between his body and the ground.

The issue is they could go dead weight (you won't always have the leverage to do anything else) and the ball carrier takes another step and suddenly his leg is now where it wasn't. Also at full speed it's going to be hard to judge anything and ball carriers could just start faking injury at important spots to gain yardage/1st down.

I don't think anyone is trying to hurt people with these tackles. It's possible but if you wanted to hurt people there are many ways and you'd be known for it.

Also the conspiracy theorist in me thinks it's going to be one sided at times favoring certain teams and certain players. Much like a lot of other judgement calls are.

[MWil23]

2 hours ago, goldfishwars said:

You don’t have to read intent into it. No defender has to drop his hip into a ball carrier’s back legs when bringing him down. The purpose of this type of tackle, is to pin the player’s joints between the ground and the side of their body. It’s dangerous and serves only to cause hurt and injury.

I think we are really in danger of weighing motivations in a split second situation here. If we really cared about player safety we’d ban Joe Mixon from using his head like a battering Ram or Derrick Henry from his face slap stiff arms, but then again we love the “violent running” but hate violent defensive contact. It’s a double standard.

[Soko]

2 hours ago, goldfishwars said:

You don’t have to read intent into it. No defender has to drop his hip into a ball carrier’s back legs when bringing him down. The purpose of this type of tackle, is to pin the player’s joints between the ground and the side of their body. It’s dangerous and serves only to cause hurt and injury.

Lol.

Does it also serve to…get the ball carrier down? Acting like this is some egregious, Neanderthal move. It’s legitimately the simplest form of tackling someone other than a hard shove - grab, don’t let go, drop my weight.

Defenders nowadays get flagged for falling on QBs with their body weight. They get flagged for avoiding that, by spinning them into the ground. Now you (for discussion’s sake) also can’t grab and drop your weight, and if you do, you’re either intentionally pulling a gladiator-level tackle or you’re negligently trying to hurt someone on the field. 

Lord.

Edited February 7, 2023 by Yin-Yang

[goldfishwars]

[MWil23]

I’d actually be willing to implement more rules if it meant doing away with the “automatic first down” nonsense.

This makes the Top 10 on SC

This is a 15 yard automatic first down penalty