A new college football rule is reportedly being discussed that would be beneficial to the Tennessee Vols’ offense.
According to Yahoo Sports college football reporter Ross Dellenger, coaches at the AFCA Convention in Charlotte are considering a rule that would require an injured player to be sidelined for the rest of the drive.
College football teams occasionally fake injuries to slow down the offense’s momentum. Tennessee, which utilizes an up-tempo offense under head coach Josh Heupel, has been the victim of this practice as much as any team in the country (though that doesn’t make the Vols completely innocent…there have been instances where it’s appeared that Tennessee has faked injuries to slow an offense, too). There have been plenty of times that Tennessee’s offense has found some momentum and started using an up-tempo approach only for a defender to suddenly get injured, leading to a stoppage in play. It’s an incredibly frustrating aspect of the game.
The new rule would state that if a player is injured, they would have to leave the game for the rest of the drive they were injured on. The team could burn a timeout to keep the player in the game.
At this point, this is just something that’s being discussed and there’s no indication whether the rule will garner enough support to be put in place.
In fact, according to Dellenger, not everyone supports the rule.
This has always seemed like the easiest way to address the fake injury concern. It also puts player safety first. If a player is legitimately injured, they get a chance to be checked out to make sure everything is good. If they want to push through it and get back on the field, then the team can use a timeout to get them back out there. All options would still be on the table, it would just prevent teams from using a fake injury to slow tempo without using a timeout (though teams could use a backup player, depending on the substitution situation, to create a stoppage and not use a timeout…there would still be ways to manipulate the rule, but it would take some creativity).
It’s not a surprise that not every coach is on board with the idea of this new rule. SEC coaches are a competitive bunch and they don’t want to give up anything they view as a competitive advantage.
As a fan of the game, I hope the rule is passed. The stoppages ruin the flow of the game. And they make games longer. It shouldn’t take four hours to play a college football game.
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