Coaching Question: Is This Still a Thing? (1 Viewer)

Back in my day, Coach would tell a punt returner to put his heels on the 10-yard line and if the ball's going over his head, to let it go.  Every week I see guys making fair catches at their own 3, 4 and 5-yard lines.

Is there some benefit to this that I'm missing, or is 15 yards of field position just not that important in today's NFL?

Ignoramus said:

Back in my day, Coach would tell a punt returner to put his heels on the 10-yard line and if the ball's going over his head, to let it go.  Every week I see guys making fair catches at their own 3, 4 and 5-yard lines.

Is there some benefit to this that I'm missing, or is 15 yards of field position just not that important in today's NFL?

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This should never happen

Ignoramus said:

Back in my day, Coach would tell a punt returner to put his heels on the 10-yard line and if the ball's going over his head, to let it go.  Every week I see guys making fair catches at their own 3, 4 and 5-yard lines.

Is there some benefit to this that I'm missing, or is 15 yards of field position just not that important in today's NFL?

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Agreed, happens every week. If I had to guess I'd say it's on the player fielding the punt every time. And they probably get reamed for it and do it again the following game .

About the only good reason I can see for doing this is if they have really outkicked the coverage and the returner can make a clean recovery with some space to gain yardage on the return. 

Otherwise may as well take your chances with the punt becoming a touchback. 

I have seen quite a few great special teams plays by coverage guys getting the ball tapped back in bounds without touching the end zone before they knock the ball back. Seen several of these already this year. Still safer than risking a muffed return and no reasonable chance of returning it to the 20 yard line if the coverage is there.

I've seen it happen a couple times where punt gunners are around the returner. In that case it makes total sense because if the ball bounces to the 1 or 2 yard line and is down, the offence loses a drive.  Being at the 5 is much better than being at the 2 yard line in that case. 

Either the coaches are just stupid now and don't teach fundamentals like that or the players are too stupid to grasp the concept...most likely both.

I mean if I'm the coach, I tell the PR to stand at the 10. If you back up and catch the ball, you will be cut. The idiot on Sunday called for a fair catch. I mean I am definitely cutting that moron.

Biabreakable said:

About the only good reason I can see for doing this is if they have really outkicked the coverage and the returner can make a clean recovery with some space to gain yardage on the return. 

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Great point, and likely the reason we see it (outside of mental mistakes). Normal TV angles on kick-offs don't always tell the story -- would be interested to see a bunch of these kicks in something like an A22 camera mode to verify.

Stompin' Tom Connors said:

Great point, and likely the reason we see it (outside of mental mistakes). Normal TV angles on kick-offs don't always tell the story -- would be interested to see a bunch of these kicks in something like an A22 camera mode to verify.

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The thread is about fair catches inside the 10

Cowboysfan8 said:

The thread is about fair catches inside the 10

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Thanks. I can actually read and comprehend like most homo sapiens. I've been on these boards for a while, but guess I didn't catch the memo that we needed to restrict any and all dialogue in threads on these boards, to a single myopic topic. 

Thought the point that Bia was made was interesting in terms of why returners would opt to return a kick that deep instead of letting it go over their heads. Please feel free to ignore it if it doesn't spark your interest, though.

Stompin' Tom Connors said:

Thanks. I can actually read and comprehend like most homo sapiens. I've been on these boards for a while, but guess I didn't catch the memo that we needed to restrict any and all dialogue in threads on these boards, to a single myopic topic. 

Thought the point that Bia was made was interesting in terms of why returners would opt to return a kick that deep instead of letting it go over their heads. Please feel free to ignore it if it doesn't spark your interest, though.

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This trend is being driven by the new rugby-style punting technique.  Punters are much better able to get balls to "check up" now, versus going end over end into the endzone if they're allowed to bounce.

If you watch, especially on shorter punts, they'll kick it closer to the ground and with the nose of the ball sort of pointing downward.  I'm probably not describing it well but it's different than the waist high, nose of the ball parallel to the ground, high follow through approach we used to see used on all punts.

The change in technique is directly in an effort to avoid touchbacks.

In response, the returner's catch zone now extends back a few more yards.

Ignoramus said:

Back in my day, Coach would tell a punt returner to put his heels on the 10-yard line and if the ball's going over his head, to let it go.  Every week I see guys making fair catches at their own 3, 4 and 5-yard lines.

Is there some benefit to this that I'm missing, or is 15 yards of field position just not that important in today's NFL?

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They're ignoramuses.

It just doesn't make sense.  If coaches are telling them to stand on the 10 and not take a step back, why the hell are they taking a step back?  It's so easy.  Yet we have people making fair catches on the freaking one yard line.

But then again, coaches are good at coaching technique.  Not so much with game specific stuff.  Just last weekend I watched Penn State taking knees at the end of the game out of the shotgun and they didn't even think to line someone up behind the QB (or even an extra player in the backfield) in case of a high snap.

I also shake my head every time a WR makes a diving catch on a screen pass 5 yards behind the line of scrimmage.  Or dives for a 2 yard catch in the middle of the field at the end of the game when they're trying to conserve time.

And of course we've also recently seen a couple QBs let time expire at the end of the half inside the 10 because they were sitting around trying to read the field instead of just throwing it away for the FG after the first read wasn't open.  Because "look for the first read and then just chuck it out of the endzone for the FG if it's not there" just isn't something that coaches say, apparently.  I mean it took what, 50 years for someone to finally tell Brian Westbrook "hey if you pick up the first down our odds are actually better if you take a knee at the 1 rather than scoring the touchdown".  And I'm not even convinced that Westbrook didn't do that on his own without any coach input.

btemp said:

I've seen it happen a couple times where punt gunners are around the returner. In that case it makes total sense because if the ball bounces to the 1 or 2 yard line and is down, the offence loses a drive.  Being at the 5 is much better than being at the 2 yard line in that case. 

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Ouch, no.  You are cut.

davearm said:

This trend is being driven by the new rugby-style punting technique.  Punters are much better able to get balls to "check up" now, versus going end over end into the endzone if they're allowed to bounce.

If you watch, especially on shorter punts, they'll kick it closer to the ground and with the nose of the ball sort of pointing downward.  I'm probably not describing it well but it's different than the waist high, nose of the ball parallel to the ground, high follow through approach we used to see used on all punts.

The change in technique is directly in an effort to avoid touchbacks.

In response, the returner's catch zone now extends back a few more yards.

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This is it exactly.

Maybe not on long boomers where the kicking team can live with the touch back, but this new "pitching wedge" trick the punters employ combined with the field turf... that ball doesn't go bounding into the end zone like it used to.

FreeBaGeL said:

I mean it took what, 50 years for someone to finally tell Brian Westbrook "hey if you pick up the first down our odds are actually better if you take a knee at the 1 rather than scoring the touchdown".  And I'm not even convinced that Westbrook didn't do that on his own without any coach input.

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it was Runyan who told him, IIRC.

Ignoramus   Im pretty sure alot of studys, and perfecting of crafts has taken place since such golden rules..

Im sure alot of Coaches knew what was coming when Ray Guy was drafted   Im more or less figuring theres a risk that the punter has placed some "english" on the ball which may cause it to react a certain way (anything which helps the kicker)  I dont have a link, but I recently watched an actual demo on TV, where the punter showed how much variance he can dictate in the ball..  Its not exactly Ray Guy special, but its kinda like downing at the 3 might be considered least of the evils..