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Mercy Rule? No thanks


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8 hours ago, dmizers3 said:

That might be the most absurd thing I've read on this forum.  You can't possibly believe that? What's your solution then?  Once a team is up by whatever @Muda69 seems too much they must take knee?  Don't ever allow your backups to try?  Or just simply end the game when a team is up by whatever score you think is too much?  Not trying to be a jerk here but come on.  

Yes, I do believe that, but coming from a supposed supporter of one of the new kings of running up the score, New Palestine,  your incredulous statement comes as no surprise.

As for your questions, yes, I do believe teams should take a knee then punt.  Your backups are in the game, you have a robust, competitive junior varsity schedule for them to develop and showcase their growing skills, what more do you want?  With a running clock the debacle will be over soon, no need to simply end the game.  After all the home venue could still earn some $ on concession sales.

 

 

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19 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Yes, I do believe that, but coming from a supposed supporter of one of the new kings of running up the score, New Palestine,  your incredulous statement comes as no surprise.

As for your questions, yes, I do believe teams should take a knee then punt.  Your backups are in the game, you have a robust, competitive junior varsity schedule for them to develop and showcase their growing skills, what more do you want?  With a running clock the debacle will be over soon, no need to simply end the game.  After all the home venue could still earn some $ on concession sales.

 

 

I would say having your backups take a knee 3 times and punt the ball starting in the second quarter might possibly be just a tad bit more demeaning than having them play the game out.

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!"    Nice lessons for children, right?

 

Literally made me laugh.............thanks!

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

Yes, I do believe that, but coming from a supposed supporter of one of the new kings of running up the score, New Palestine,  your incredulous statement comes as no surprise.

As for your questions, yes, I do believe teams should take a knee then punt.  Your backups are in the game, you have a robust, competitive junior varsity schedule for them to develop and showcase their growing skills, what more do you want?  With a running clock the debacle will be over soon, no need to simply end the game.  After all the home venue could still earn some $ on concession sales.

 

 

Wow, just wow.  So you're in favor of a more demeaning form of play?  You also appear to be in favor of teaching kids that its fine if someone is better than you and don't worry about working hard to try to improve.   And yes, there are times when teams have run up the score, but to call out schools and say that every 35 point win is running it up without any specific knowledge of the situation is completely irresponsible. 

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The one thing I would change is do not start the running clock until the 4 quarter.  Other sports that have some kind of mercy rule does not start until at least 2/3 of the game had been the played 

My other thought would be say 49 points at any time during the game or 35 in the 4th quarter to start the running clock and you can not start using the running clock during the middle of the quarter unless it is the in the 4 quarter 

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2 hours ago, dmizers3 said:

Wow, just wow.  So you're in favor of a more demeaning form of play?  You also appear to be in favor of teaching kids that its fine if someone is better than you and don't worry about working hard to try to improve.   And yes, there are times when teams have run up the score, but to call out schools and say that every 35 point win is running it up without any specific knowledge of the situation is completely irresponsible. 

It is a game played by children and controlled by hyper-competitive adults, is it not?   

And please give me some examples of this 'specific knowledge of the situation;.

96-0. Never forget.

 

 

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11 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

It is a game played by children and controlled by hyper-competitive adults, is it not?   

And please give me some examples of this 'specific knowledge of the situation;.

96-0. Never forget.

 

 

I will definitely agree it is a kids game, and typically when there are problems,  no matter what the problem might be, it is usually caused by over competitive adults.  And there is a fine line that sometimes gets crossed.   But you also can't just look at a final score and say team A ran it up. That's my only point.

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On 8/25/2019 at 9:47 AM, Bobref said:

One positive aspect of the mercy rule — at least, from my viewpoint — we won’t have the endless debates on the GID about whether someone ran up the score on someone else.

Knowing some of the combatants in those debates, I'm not sure the mercy rule will preclude a debate.

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

It is a game played by children and controlled by hyper-competitive adults, is it not?   

And please give me some examples of this 'specific knowledge of the situation;.

96-0. Never forget.

 

 

Half of those young men on the playing field are 18 years old. Referring to them as children is pretty demeaning. 

97-0. Yes, I do believe you are referring to Dekalb. Coach Ron Kock took his team to the state finals and got waxed 35-0. Rules shouldn't be justified by what one coach did in 1994. For every one coach who runs up the score, you have 10 coaches who don't. One hundred points could be dropped on an opponent in Indiana at least 5 times per week if the coaches really wanted to. By and large, coaches just don't do that..............for two reasons. Reason number one is that they don't want to humiliate the other team. Reason number two is that they are smart enough to rest their starters and give valuable time to the younger players. 

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1 hour ago, BTF said:

Half of those young men on the playing field are 18 years old. Referring to them as children is pretty demeaning. 

97-0. Yes, I do believe you are referring to Dekalb. Coach Ron Kock took his team to the state finals and got waxed 35-0. Rules shouldn't be justified by what one coach did in 1994. For every one coach who runs up the score, you have 10 coaches who don't. One hundred points could be dropped on an opponent in Indiana at least 5 times per week if the coaches really wanted to. By and large, coaches just don't do that..............for two reasons. Reason number one is that they don't want to humiliate the other team. Reason number two is that they are smart enough to rest their starters and give valuable time to the younger players. 

You sure about the 50% being 18?  Maybe if football were played in the spring........................

And no, 96-0 refers to October 17th, 2008.  A day that will live in Clinton county infamy:  http://pastfb.homestead.com/logs/ClintonPrairie.htm#loaded

 

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

You sure about the 50% being 18?  Maybe if football were played in the spring........................

And no, 96-0 refers to October 17th, 2008.  A day that will live in Clinton county infamy:  http://pastfb.homestead.com/logs/ClintonPrairie.htm#loaded

 

@Muda69 I reviewed the link you provided. Found it interesting that since 1994 there were 28 occasions you “beat” your opponent by 35+ points. Several opponents such as Turkey Run, Tri-West, Lapel, etc. you did it multiple times. Once you even scored 77 points to their 0. 

Does this lay heavy on you conscious? Is this why you have numerous losing seasons because you have influenced your school to play fair? Does your school take a knee when facing an overmatched opponent? The record indicates otherwise. Tongue firmly in cheek for those that can’t tell otherwise. 

 

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1 hour ago, Warriorfan said:

I can see both sides of this issue but I am sure some would agree that it does send a message that if you are down that far there is no use in continuing to play hard since the clock is now against you as well.

“Some” probably would agree. Some would not. For the most part, if the Mercy Rule is invoked, the kids still play hard. It’s just not necessarily the same kids, and they don’t play quite as long.

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4 hours ago, Muda69 said:

You sure about the 50% being 18?  Maybe if football were played in the spring........................

And no, 96-0 refers to October 17th, 2008.  A day that will live in Clinton county infamy:  http://pastfb.homestead.com/logs/ClintonPrairie.htm#loaded

 

Seriously, half these "children" have beards. We're not talking about Pal football. 

 

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14 hours ago, SenatorFan said:

@Muda69 I reviewed the link you provided. Found it interesting that since 1994 there were 28 occasions you “beat” your opponent by 35+ points. Several opponents such as Turkey Run, Tri-West, Lapel, etc. you did it multiple times. Once you even scored 77 points to their 0. 

Does this lay heavy on you conscious? Is this why you have numerous losing seasons because you have influenced your school to play fair? Does your school take a knee when facing an overmatched opponent? The record indicates otherwise. Tongue firmly in cheek for those that can’t tell otherwise. 

 

Who exactly is "you" in your statement?  And who exactly is "my" team?  

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13 hours ago, Bobref said:

“Some” probably would agree. Some would not. For the most part, if the Mercy Rule is invoked, the kids still play hard. It’s just not necessarily the same kids, and they don’t play quite as long.

Its been my experience on the sideline that when a team is getting beat and a running clock was used, they lost a good portion of their competitive spirit. I understand your point but be it starters looking for cheap points against the winning teams 2nds and 3rds or it the jv of the losing team, they still seem demoralized knowing they have went to a running clock.

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1 hour ago, Warriorfan said:

Its been my experience on the sideline that when a team is getting beat and a running clock was used, they lost a good portion of their competitive spirit. I understand your point but be it starters looking for cheap points against the winning teams 2nds and 3rds or it the jv of the losing team, they still seem demoralized knowing they have went to a running clock.

Show me a team that is not demoralized when they’re down by at least 35 points in the 2nd half, and I’ll show you a team that is not demoralized by a running clock.

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2 hours ago, Warriorfan said:

but be it starters looking for cheap points against the winning teams 2nds and 3rds or it the jv of the losing team, they still seem demoralized knowing they have went to a running clock.

Well, in our game Friday night, when the score was 35-0 at the half and our opponent had 3 turn-overs, 1 first down (on the first play of the game), and less than 60 yards of total offense, they didn't look too demoralized when their varsity scored 3 TDs in the 4th Q against our back up JV kids, which is essentially freshman and sophomores.  In fact, their coach burned time-outs to stop the clock and they celebrated wildly when they scored each TD.  While I disagree entirely with that approach, they certainly were trying to build some confidence going into Wk. 2.  

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Played a JV game last night with 13 players and had another 14 standing on the sidelines for emergency only and Special teams.     I had 5 lineman, Center hurt shoulder, so with 8 mins left of the game, I put a kid who snapped before at center wearing #13 so not to burn a Freshman quarter since he has 4 quarters to play on Thursday.   Thanks DUMB 4 quarter SUB VARSITY rule.  Appreciate ya      

Now if this was 2018, I would had 14 players to use at least 1 quarter and designate each one which quarter they would play and they still would of been able to play all 4 on this Thursday's Freshman game.  

Again, new quarter rule is far more an issue than the 35 point running clock for teams like our who still want to run 3 teams to maximize reps and progress thru the program.   

 

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3 hours ago, Bobref said:

Show me a team that is not demoralized when they’re down by at least 35 points in the 2nd half, and I’ll show you a team that is not demoralized by a running clock.

I have coached a team that had been down 30 and we fought back and lost by 4  we were not demoralized, we put the ball on the ground 4 times lost them all and threw a pick that led to a score.  Just because a team has given up points doesn't mean they are ready to give up.  That's a poor philosophy that I would never espouse in a team. Give up if you want ill coach to keep trying in the face of even extreme adversity.  

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2 hours ago, Coach Nowlin said:

Played a JV game last night with 13 players and had another 14 standing on the sidelines for emergency only and Special teams.     I had 5 lineman, Center hurt shoulder, so with 8 mins left of the game, I put a kid who snapped before at center wearing #13 so not to burn a Freshman quarter since he has 4 quarters to play on Thursday.   Thanks DUMB 4 quarter SUB VARSITY rule.  Appreciate ya      

Now if this was 2018, I would had 14 players to use at least 1 quarter and designate each one which quarter they would play and they still would of been able to play all 4 on this Thursday's Freshman game.  

Again, new quarter rule is far more an issue than the 35 point running clock for teams like our who still want to run 3 teams to maximize reps and progress thru the program.   

 

I’ve seen teams use the same kid for all freshman game (starter played all 4 quarters) jv game (starter played all 4 quarters) and on special teams on varsity. What’s the punishment? You forfeit the jv and freshman games? Who cares?

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2 hours ago, Warriorfan said:

I have coached a team that had been down 30 and we fought back and lost by 4  we were not demoralized, we put the ball on the ground 4 times lost them all and threw a pick that led to a score.  Just because a team has given up points doesn't mean they are ready to give up.  That's a poor philosophy that I would never espouse in a team. Give up if you want ill coach to keep trying in the face of even extreme adversity.  

You completely misread the intent of my post. If a team is going to be demoralized by a running clock, they are very likely already demoralized by being behind so far that the running clock kicks in. Not saying there aren’t a few exceptions. But you don’t make a rule for the few exceptions, you make it for the overwhelming majority of cases. The good the mercy rule does: takes the onus off of the coaches who will be second- and third-guessed whatever decision they make, minimizes the risk of injury when a team is just physically outclassed, reduces some of the hard feelings that might otherwise arise in a blowout, and which tend to escalate as time winds down in the game, far outweighs the few and far between exceptions.

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