Quote:
Originally Posted by Syd Thrift
Yeah there’s a really specific run in college about advancing on fumbles. I’m the NFL you just can’t fumble forward on purpose, a clause that was added after the Holy Roller play of the 1970s. But yeah either way you can lateral all you want; it’s sort of a throwback to the beginnings of the game when you weren’t supposed to throw it forward at all or, for a little bit, there was a limitation as to how far forward you could throw it on an actual grid that was laid out on the field (I believe the origin of the term “gridiron”).
It’s also sometimes one of those things like the drop kick or the fair catch kick that is easy to forget still exists because nobody has used it regularly for years. In the case of laterals, though, they’re basically what you see on pitch plays, flea flickers, and the hook and ladder play (not to mention the whole deal where a team will just start lateraling the ball at the end of a game in a last ditch effort to score).
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I agree. The holy roller cracked me up. I don't think they needed to make a rule. If you fumble, forward or not, it should be ok IMO. Stabler pretty much admitted he did it on purpose. But that's a ref issue. They had to see him just chuck the ball forward. What were they looking at?