Kenneth Sims

I wonder why no one ever considers how fair it is to the defense to not allow them to change personnel. Yes, the Patriots are using the hurry-up to their advantage, but it has been used against them in the past especially by the Colts. The NFL rules are tilted so heavily in favor of offense these days. Maybe, something should be done to help defenses for once. My suggestion: Other than in the last 2 minutes of a half, on every 1st down the umpire spots the ball but stands over it for 10 seconds to allow for defensive substitutions while the play clock continues to run.

tunafish

Maybe you could disallow substitutions as well as keeping the player in question out the rest of a possession (obviously you would still be allowed to substitute someone in for the downed player, but you could restrict it so you would have to exchange a DB for DB or LB for LB etc.)-- that way the defense isn't allowed to change personnel groupings

Bobs My Uncle

Make a rule that teams allotted TO's include injury situations as well.

Sivy

They should be fined and ejected...The jets did this in the playoff game agains the pats. It was so fake it wasnt even funny. Its the only way to slow down the no huddle without taking a T.O.

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livinginthe past

Two solutions to work n concert.

1. The player being substituted cannot re-enter the game for 10 minutes or the remainder of the quarter - whichever is longer.

2. When the substitution takes place only the player who is injured can be replaced with a like for like player ie DB for DB.

I am not in favor of fines - these do not offer any type of restitution to the team being wronged by the flopping - and the sums involved would likely to be paltry compared to the value of winning a game (and maybe a playoff game at that)

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Big-T

How about if a player goes down injured when the opposition is running the no huddle, it costs a team time out whether it's in the last 2 minutes or not.

patchick

So does that mean that if you see an opponent starting to cramp up, all you have to do is run to the LOS instead of the huddle and the other team loses a TO?

Lots of the other suggestions IMO require too much of a judgment call from the officials. E.g., how can you say "you only get to sub for the guy who went down" if there were already players heading on/off the field? What counts as a "hurry up"? How do you identify a "flop"? Etc.

The only simple, practical penalty I've seen proposed is a "you're out until the ball changes hands" rule. That works regardless of how much time is on the clock, doesn't require timing/babysitting/subjective judgments, etc.

ctpatsfan77

Well, interestingly enough, here's what the 2010 rulebook has to say on this issue:

I would argue that a fair penalty would be, say, $250,000 against Coughlin, $500,000 against the team, and forfeiture of a first- or second- and third-round draft picks. . . .

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Wolfpack

That's exactly the solution I was going to suggest, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it implemented. Some time ago they changed the rule so that if a player got injured inside 2 minutes, the team was charged a time out no matter what. And if they didn't have a time out, 10 seconds are run off the clock (unless it is the defense with an injured player and the offense didn't want any time run off).

I think they'll move to a situation where these questionable injuries will cost a time out.

Wolfpack

Well I'll say this... the way 2 guys completely and totally flopped on the same play at the same time in a virtually identical fashion sure shows to me that it was something that was coached into them, and not just one of them acting on his own.