Strange illegal trick play?

good idea if you want to take a safety when your up. LOL . In this case they have 47 seconds and after the safety they have a 1 point lead. Guys, pay more attention to the score up top. Now, Birmingham (sp?) will kick it back and defend. Notice that the commentator says the Frankfurt team has all its time outs. The birmingham coach must not want to take a chance, Strange:)

I had to go over that a few times to understand why they pulled that stunt.

I am with you coachD. With 47 secs to go I want the ball and a 4 point lead. Jcarb, please help me understand what you are talking about.

Simple, 47 seconds to go and the other team has ALL their times out. If you run it out of the endzone you risk a fumble or maybe get pinned deep. Now, you keep the ball and lets say you can shave some time off the clock. Lets think run here since any incomplete just stops the clock and the other team does not have to waste a time-out.

Clock at 47 sec-1st and 10-run stuffed- firs time out.
Clock at 43 sec-2nd and ? -run stuffed- call 2nd time-out.
Clock at 39 sec-3rd and ? - run stuffed-call 3rd and last TO.
Clock at 35 sec-4th and ?-BIG QUESTION HERE!!

Do you run it and get stuffed?? Score is 34-31 (not a 4 point lead like the other poster mentioned but a 3 point lead) They could kick a field goal maybe run one play before the FG attempt.

Do you punt it?? Could get it blocked or maybe they could run it backfor a TD or get in FG range. How long is the punters range??

So now we have the OTHER option and they take the safety. They will procede to kick off without the danger of it getting blocked and the kick will be longer. The only danger is that they run it back for a TD or get in FG range.

This coached picked his poison. The other team had the momentum since they just scored (they where kicking off) and this coach would rather have his defense defend and the other team drive the length of the field than take as much risk. He knew something we don't.

So know you can bash me but I have won several games this way. Sometimes you win by taking a safety. But then again I am not as smart as other coaches on this board.

1st down

Not at all. You can't fumble if you don't have the ball.

If the would have kneeled they would have shaven about six to twelve seconds off the clock before they punted on 4th down (clocked is stopped thanks to the time out after the 3rd down ). Then you have to add the potential of a blocked punt. I also doubt the punter can kick as far from the punt mechanichs as the kick-off man from the tee. I also think you kick off from your 15 or 20 after a safety while the punter would have been 13 yards behind the long snapper placing him in the 7 yard line.

This coach just transfered the RISK to the other team. Very smart move I would say.

You clearly don't understand the game. Here's how I would have played it. Take the touchback (getting the ball on the 20). Take a knee on first down (instructing my players to block really well, i.e hold, wasting more time). Second down repeat, third down repeat. Fourth down instead of taking the knee in bounds, my QB will run into the endzone, and wait to the first person from the D to get away from the hold, I mean off the block, then I will take the free kick. I get to the same place you do, less time on the clock. And yes, I messed up the score earlier.

I could be wrong, but Frankfurt is the losing team(by 3). Hamburg kicked to them and instead of driving with 3 timeouts to win or tie they get a safety. Which means Hamburg goes up by 5 and gets the ball. Maybe I have the teams mixed up since I dont watch to much Europe football, but I think it is the Frankfurt Galaxy and that is there uniform.

Funny, they got the same result (taking the safety and kicking the ball) without having to do all that. They did not run any additional risk. It is about RISK.

Coach,

Since I am wrong on the team I guess it was a Stupid move by that team. Now, time outs are equal since they would have used them (in the other scenerio) either way to stop the clock.

Incorrect. In the first assumption that it was a "smart" move, you forget to factor in that by "taking the safety" essentially gave the opponents "6" timeouts, by giving them the ball back with the full 47 seconds AND 3 time outs. This allows them to attack any part of the field in an attempt to get into field goal range, rather than :
a) have no timeouts and have to drive into FG range or
b) have no timeouts and have to drive the length of the field.

Coach,

I did this (take a safety) at the varsity level in a game that we where up 3-0 with 31 seconds left in the game. At that point we where pinned on our own 4 yard line when we had our QB run it out of the back of the endzone. We kicked the ball from our 20 or 25 and they ran it back to their 40. They had all their time outs but we felt our defense could hold them just like they did all game. It was a defensive battle and we won 3-2. Now, I knew we had a better chance.

The above play was a bonehead move. The problem is you always play to your strength. Maybe you think giving the ball up to a team with all their time outs and 47 seconds is crazy.
I would rather give the other team a chance to shoot themselves in the foot if I think my defense can hold.

I agree with the thought. We actually practice taking a safety out of our punt formation where we tackle the 10 guys rushing to block the punt and the punter (ok it's the qb because he's a better athlete) stands in the endzone waiting for the return man to run the 35 yards to "tackle" him (the other 10 should be on the ground, in a bear hug). Yes it's holding, but is the defense going to take the penalty? No, they want the ball and we free kick it. They above situation was backwards, so the argument in this case is mute, but if the leading team was receiving the ball, taking a safety on the kickoff, kneel to run off some clock and have them waste their timeout, then take the safety and put it in the hands of your D.

But looking at the video, the receiving team, who was losing, was trying a trick play, hopeing to get lucking and win the game, but someone messed up bigtime!

the next day, player was cut. hahahaha

I was confused about what everyone was arguing about. I thought I was blind looking at the score. It was 34-31 Hamburg and Hamburg was kicking to Frankfurt.