Cheating Dolphins?

[twenty-eight]

Haha. Brady sounds so bitter. The Dolphins always play the pats well...

[No_Pressure]

Yeah, thats cheating, and Peyton Manning audibling at the line is cheating too right? :doh:

[twenty-eight]

Yeah, thats cheating, and Peyton Manning audibling at the line is cheating too right? :doh:

:laugh:

Yup! And so is the no-huddle, right tr1??

[hervoicehoneyed]

the offense always has an unfair advantage, especially since the QB has a mic in his helmet and the coach can talk to him until there is 15 seconds left on the play clock.

I was going to mention that in tr1's "no huddle unfair" thread. Does any player on the defense have a mic on their helmet?

[tr1]

I was going to mention that in tr1's "no huddle unfair" thread. Does any player on the defense have a mic on their helmet?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-Huddle_Offense

Not to belabor the point, but any student of the game would see that the no-huddle was and still is controversial because of it gains an advantage by not allowing the substitution of defensive players.

Don't believe me, read these two items:

History of the no-huddle

The "no-huddle" approach to play calling has existed in some form in the game of football since plays were first designed, however, it was not implemented as a major part of the game strategy until the Cincinnati Bengals head coach Sam Wyche began to heavily rely on the approach.

During the late '80s Wyche took notice that when the offense went to a fast-paced rate of play-calling or running the defense appeared to fatigue quicker than the offense. He then developed an approach to take advantage of heavy-substitution based defensive schemes of that era. There were many specialized individuals and when a team suspects the other team may attempt a pass it was customary to switch out most of the defensive backfield. This would mean the players were more accustomed to solely run or pass-stopping techniques. By quickly substituting or going up to the line before the defense can substitute, the offense hoped to get mismatches where a run player would be forced to play out-of-position. The quick pace of approaching the line would also limit defensive coaches the opportunity to asses their situation, make adjustments and sometimes, even to get their call in to the players (this was before the in-helmet radios were implemented).

The Bengals' use of this ploy proved to be highly successful, but also controversial. There are many noted incidents where coaches instructed players to disrupt the pace the offense was calling plays by feigning injuries, interfering with placing the ball at scrimmage as well as general complaints about unsportsmanlike practices to the league officials.

In response to this tactic the NFL instituted many rules related to this tactic some including:

* Allowing the defense ample time for substitutions if the offense does

* If a player's injury causes the play-clock to stop, the player must sit out at least one play

* Charging a time-out to a team when a player is injured within a certain time period of the game

The tactic was used by the franchise from the late 80s while Sam Wyche was the coach. The main rivals for AFC supremacy were the Buffalo Bills, coached by Marv Levy. Most of the high-profile games (the various games for AFC Conference titles and regular season games) between the two led to these changes in NFL rules.

Wyche recalled that before the '88 AFC title game the Buffalo Bills had seemingly convinced league officials to penalize the Bengals for running a no-huddle offense. In a statement made to the Bengals' press in 2005, he relayed "The NFL was nice enough to come to us an hour and 55 minutes before the game and tell us we would be given a 15-yard penalty every time we used it. Of course we had practiced it all week. We told them if they wanted to answer to the public for changing the competitive balance of the AFC championship game, that was up to them, but we were using it. They never dropped a flag."

The ironic part was afterwards the Bills began to employ the no-huddle (with Jim Kelly) and used it to near-perfection, winning the AFC title four years straight.

And, here's the Colt's owner, complaining about defenses substituting against the no-huddle:

Q: The problem of teams faking injuries to slow down the no-huddle offense seems to be getting worse. Anything that can be done?

A: I’m going to give you a lengthy answer, because I’ve changed my mind on this in recent weeks.

I was involved in this back in 1988, I believe, in the AFC Championship Game. I was with Buffalo. The week prior to the AFC Championship Game, the Seattle Seahawks had feigned injuries on virtually every series of downs because the Cincinnati Bengals – then coached by Sam Wyche – would come off the sidelines with 14 or 15 players in the huddle, then they would quickly run off the field, or they would reverse it and have 14 or 15 players on the sideline and run in together. You didn’t know which personnel group was in the game. To prevent that from happening, the Seahawks faked injuries.

Anytime the Bengals brought personnel on the field, they would fake in injury. It was obvious what was taking place.

The following Monday, the Monday prior to the AFC Championship Game, in which the Bills were going to play the Cincinnati Bengals, I received a call from Commissioner (Pete) Rozelle himself, personally. I was just a young general manager at the time. You can imagine how I felt when my assistant said, ‘Commissioner Rozelle is on the line.’ I said, ‘Uh-oh, what did we do now?’ But Commissioner Rozelle made it clear that the feigning of injuries was not going to be tolerated at the highest levels of the league and he was as high as it got. He said, ‘I want your word that you will not feign injuries.’

Naturally, I said, ‘Commissioner, we will do anything you ask us to do.’ We meant that, coach (Marv) Levy and myself and Mr. (Ralph) Wilson, the owner of the Bills. Because we have too much respect for the game and the league to do something that would harm the league.

The Commissioner said, ‘That’s good, because I think this is bad for the league. Feigning of injuries is bad for the league. There is a rule in the book against it. It’s not good for our game and I’m not going to allow it.’

Fast forward to the day before the game. The Commissioner had one of his assistants – Don Weiss, subsequently a good friend and a man who passed away far too early last year – come to both teams and say, ‘This is the way we’re going to handle this game. We made a rule for this game and the Super Bowl that if the offense substitutes in any way the defense will be allowed to substitute and the ball won’t be put in play until such time that the defense is ready to go.’ That rule was codified the following spring by the Competition Committee and that’s the way it has been ever since.

As I said early in the year it’s now confined only to our games because we’re largely the only team that runs the no-huddle except in the two-minute period. What we now find is whenever teams want to substitute, or whenever they feel – particularly three-four teams – that their big, heavy linemen need a rest on an 11- or 12-play drive they simply feign an injury.

On Sunday, there were four times it happened. We saw a situation where in fact the trainers came on the field before the designated player was down. They were a little early onto the field. That’s because we think, and we have evidence to prove it, that the signal to go down is given from the sidelines. This has gone too far. It’s ridiculous. It’s not in the spirit of the game.

We intend to bring it before the Competition Committee this coming spring, but we think that the league office – perhaps even the Commissioner – should do what Commissioner Rozelle did many years ago and take severe action against people who simply defy this rule by simply saying, ‘Any time we’re tired, any time we’ve got the wrong personnel grouping on the field’ – even though the Colts don’t substitute – ‘any time we need to get people on the field, any time we want to change, we simply dive.’ There’s a rule against it.

If you saw the replay Sunday you saw Tony and the official discussing it and the official sort of shrugging his shoulders and saying, ‘What can I do?’ They’re right. You can’t do anything about it because they can’t predict whether the player is legitimately hurt or whether he’s just trying to feign an injury in order to gain an advantage.

You might say, ‘How can you possibly say that people are feigning injuries?’ Here’s why. In all cases Sunday, the player who was hurt came back into the game within one or two plays of leaving the game. Secondly, you are required if a player is injured to notify the television broadcasters and the press. There was never any notification given when any of those players left the game. As far as public recognition of an injury is concerned, it didn’t take place.

It’s clear to us that the preponderance of evidence suggests that people are taking a dive and there are some teams that do it repeatedly. In one case, there’s a team that has done it six consecutive games, a division opponent. We’ve sort of had enough of it. It’s something that needs to be called to the attention of league officials and we’re going to do it.

Q: But can you get anything done?

A: I don’t know. I think we can get something done with the Competition Committee because there are a number of ways you can address it. You can say if a player leaves a game because of injury, he has to stay out for the entire series.

You can go back to the old college rule. If you left the game because of injuries, you couldn’t come back in the same quarter. That was a reaction to something that happened between Notre Dame and the University of Iowa way back in the early 1950s – a feigned injury that gave Notre Dame another play that kept their unbeaten streak alive. Sportsmanlike is the wrong word to use when you’re talking about professional athletics, but we have a rule that Commissioner Rozelle clearly stated for the good of the game. It’s simply being spat upon by certain people and it’s very distasteful. It shouldn’t happen.

http://www.colts.com/sub.cfm?page=article7&news_id=3314

I still believe it puts defenses in an unfair advantage...but hey, I like defense.

:laugh:

[Westbrook36]

but hey, I like defense.

Man, with the Skins about to set a futility record for sacks/turnovers, you must be miserable!

Zing!!!

I'll be here all night, folks.

[twenty-eight]

Swing and a miss, westy:)

[ejay183]

Sounds like Tom Brady and the "great" Bill are pissed that they are losing games now. They play in a weak division and now the teams are getting better and the Pats dont are having trouble. Grab a tissue Brady, the Phins beat you, deal with it

[ejay183]

Sounds like Tom Brady and the "great" Bill are pissed that they are losing games now. They play in a weak division and now the teams are getting better and the Pats dont are having trouble. Grab a tissue Brady, the Phins beat you, deal with it

[twenty-eight]

I wouldnt call the AFC East a weak divison. It's better than the NFC East....I guess that really isnt saying much

[AzSkinsFan63]

First off...I don''t think there is any way you can get the tape of a regular NFL televised game and pump up the volume to hear the QB enough to game plan..so that is B.S.

Now it sounds to me like this is the excuse being made for intercepting communications during the game which is illegal.

Seriously, we are supposed to believe they got film of Brady audibling enough to game plan agains it??? The film provided to the teams provides no sound.

I'm sorry that's sounds rediculious! They were doing what is now happening around the league. Illegal interception of communication play calling during the game..

It's easy to spot when it happens..the defense guesses right 99.5 percent of the team. Never does an offense call a play that the defense is caught by surprise. That is physically impossible to be 100% accurate on guessing the offensive play call.

I believe this is happening more and more each season. Sad!