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Iowa Dline. Is this play legal?

KnightSlayer

Well-Known Member
Sep 8, 2014
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I seem to remember seeing a Penn State player being flagged (Defensive holding) for this type of play but, I can't be sure. Iowa's DEs did this repeatedly on Saturday. This play it was Epenesa going against Fries but, they also did it to Nelson.

 
Nothing wrong with that play, defense can use their hands
Question for you as I know you have a background in coaching ....

Do you really think the last play was run exactly as drawn up or did someone run a wrong route considering we had three receivers and three defenders in a very tight box? I can see where JJ's route would have made sense if one or two of the receivers on the left went left, but to have all three wind up in the same general area was really asking for the pass to be tipped or batted down, imo.
 
Question for you as I know you have a background in coaching ....

Do you really think the last play was run exactly as drawn up or did someone run a wrong route considering we had three receivers and three defenders in a very tight box? I can see where JJ's route would have made sense if one or two of the receivers on the left went left, but to have all three wind up in the same general area was really asking for the pass to be tipped or batted down, imo.
I believe it was. I believe Johnson would typically run a corner route in that concept, and he told Joe that the defender was all over the corner route all day. They drew it up on the fly for Johnson to run the post and he knew he would be open as the defender was expecting the corner. Trace was looking for Johnson all the way.
 
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I believe it was. I believe Johnson would typically run a corner route in that concept, and he told Joe that the defender was all over the corner route all day. They drew it up on the fly for Johnson to run the post and he knew he would be open as the defender was expecting the corner. Trace was looking for Johnson all the way.
Scroll down I linked a YouTube of JM diagraming what I believe is this play (but not the drawn up in the dirt variation) while he was at Fordham if it wasn't this play it was close
 
Sure the defensive player can use his hands, but it sure looks like he grabs Fries' jersey and pulls him to the ground. The OL can use their hands too, but I'd bet that play would be called holding if Fries did what was done to him. It's really legal for the DL to pull down like that?
 
Scroll down I linked a YouTube of JM diagraming what I believe is this play (but not the drawn up in the dirt variation) while he was at Fordham if it wasn't this play it was close
I did watch that. I believe it was the same concept or very close. Backside drag and stick route, with frontside go/post and corner. Barkley stayed in to block so it appears to be modified for short yardage. Just a great play, and credit for JoMo for listening to his players, and for the players being smart enough to suggest a new concept they knew would work.

By the way a close friend on mine played with JoMo at Fordham and remains in contact. I have no inside info on Joe's aspirations or plans for the future, but I understand Joe is a great guy and always has been.
 
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Sure the defensive player can use his hands, but it sure looks like he grabs Fries' jersey and pulls him to the ground. The OL can use their hands too, but I'd bet that play would be called holding if Fries did what was done to him. It's really legal for the DL to pull down like that?

A pull/yank and throw is legal. Holding would be called if the defender was grasping the OL guy in a way to prevent him from getting to the 2nd level, or getting out to block on a screen. Don't see it called very often though as it has to be egregious.
 
Sure the defensive player can use his hands, but it sure looks like he grabs Fries' jersey and pulls him to the ground. The OL can use their hands too, but I'd bet that play would be called holding if Fries did what was done to him. It's really legal for the DL to pull down like that?
Yes
 
Perfectly fine and well executed. When the OL gets off balance you pull around them using their loss of leverage to your advantage. If Fries grabbed hold of him to prevent him from going around him, then yes Fries would have and should have been called for holding.
 
Question for you as I know you have a background in coaching ....

Do you really think the last play was run exactly as drawn up or did someone run a wrong route considering we had three receivers and three defenders in a very tight box? I can see where JJ's route would have made sense if one or two of the receivers on the left went left, but to have all three wind up in the same general area was really asking for the pass to be tipped or batted down, imo.

They weren't in the exact same area. The wide receiver from the left side ran a "shallow" crossing slant pattern. Juwan Johnson ran a "hard post" from the slot. The "wide receiver" on Johnson's side also ran a parallel post to Johnson and was at least 10 yards to his right at the point JJ caught the ball. IOW, they were all running routes at "different levels" allowing McSorley to identify the best mis-match to throw to. The ball was clearly being thrown to Johnson not the receiver running the shallow crossing route from other side.

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE - go watch the play in slow motion, Johnson's defender was completely burned on the inside cut and was at least 3 yards behind Johnson and to his right side (i.e. not on the inside where the ball was thrown)
 
I like this PaFootbalguy's input. Solid new poster (at least I haven't seen his posts before).

I hope you stick around this insane asylum
 
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Perfectly fine and well executed. When the OL gets off balance you pull around them using their loss of leverage to your advantage. If Fries grabbed hold of him to prevent him from going around him, then yes Fries would have and should have been called for holding.

The issue with Fries is he allowed himself to get overextended and lost his leverage. Fries has got to do a better initial punch and get his head back and lower his base.
 
Question for you as I know you have a background in coaching ....

Do you really think the last play was run exactly as drawn up or did someone run a wrong route considering we had three receivers and three defenders in a very tight box? I can see where JJ's route would have made sense if one or two of the receivers on the left went left, but to have all three wind up in the same general area was really asking for the pass to be tipped or batted down, imo.


Listen to (or read) Franklin's press conference from yesterday he addresses this right off the bat.
 
They weren't in the exact same area. The wide receiver from the left side ran a "shallow" crossing slant pattern. Juwan Johnson ran a "hard post" from the slot. The "wide receiver" on Johnson's side also ran a parallel post to Johnson and was at least 10 yards to his right at the point JJ caught the ball. IOW, they were all running routes at "different levels" allowing McSorley to identify the best mis-match to throw to. The ball was clearly being thrown to Johnson not the receiver running the shallow crossing route from other side.

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE - go watch the play in slow motion, Johnson's defender was completely burned on the inside cut and was at least 3 yards behind Johnson and to his right side (i.e. not on the inside where the ball was thrown)

The players and staff have acknowledged they changed Johnson's route from a corner to a post because the corner and the safety were over playing the corner route. If you watch the play from the end zone cam you can see both the corner and safety make an initial move at the snap to the outside which prevents them from recovering to cover the route. As for Hamilton being in the area, he ran his route as designed. I think in the heat of battle the staff failed to change Hams route to something other than a post. Fortunately due Ham being in the slot versus the wing, they didn't interfere with each other. We got lucky, Franklin admitted the same in his presser yesterday when he mentioned there were far too many guys around the ball.
 
I like this PaFootbalguy's input. Solid new poster (at least I haven't seen his posts before).

I hope you stick around this insane asylum

Glad to be here. I used to post on the other board, but that one is now completely dead and figured it was time to venture over here.
 
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They weren't in the exact same area. The wide receiver from the left side ran a "shallow" crossing slant pattern. Juwan Johnson ran a "hard post" from the slot. The "wide receiver" on Johnson's side also ran a parallel post to Johnson and was at least 10 yards to his right at the point JJ caught the ball. IOW, they were all running routes at "different levels" allowing McSorley to identify the best mis-match to throw to. The ball was clearly being thrown to Johnson not the receiver running the shallow crossing route from other side.

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE - go watch the play in slow motion, Johnson's defender was completely burned on the inside cut and was at least 3 yards behind Johnson and to his right side (i.e. not on the inside where the ball was thrown)
Why does every response of yours sound like you want to argue?
 
They weren't in the exact same area. The wide receiver from the left side ran a "shallow" crossing slant pattern. Juwan Johnson ran a "hard post" from the slot. The "wide receiver" on Johnson's side also ran a parallel post to Johnson and was at least 10 yards to his right at the point JJ caught the ball. IOW, they were all running routes at "different levels" allowing McSorley to identify the best mis-match to throw to. The ball was clearly being thrown to Johnson not the receiver running the shallow crossing route from other side.

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE - go watch the play in slow motion, Johnson's defender was completely burned on the inside cut and was at least 3 yards behind Johnson and to his right side (i.e. not on the inside where the ball was thrown)

Here are your words:

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE

I found the transcript from Franklin's press conference yesterday. Here are his exact words:

Everybody is talking about that last play. I think that last play is probably a really good example of why we didn't execute as well as we would have liked in the red zone. If you watch that ball thrown, there's like eight people going for that ball, defensive players, offensive players. Our distribution wasn't really good. On the back side, our routes, we're kind of shortcutting routes, we're rolling routes. We're not getting to our depth. So that's why you saw way too many people near the ball.

Clearly, someone should tell Franklin that he doesn't know what he is talking about and there's a guy (Bushy, FRTT, etc.) on the PSU message board that knows better than him.
 
Here are your words:

Your notion that there were lots of defenders around Johnson at the point in his route where he catches the ball is laughable and simply NOT TRUE

I found the transcript from Franklin's press conference yesterday. Here are his exact words:

Everybody is talking about that last play. I think that last play is probably a really good example of why we didn't execute as well as we would have liked in the red zone. If you watch that ball thrown, there's like eight people going for that ball, defensive players, offensive players. Our distribution wasn't really good. On the back side, our routes, we're kind of shortcutting routes, we're rolling routes. We're not getting to our depth. So that's why you saw way too many people near the ball.

Clearly, someone should tell Franklin that he doesn't know what he is talking about and there's a guy (Bushy, FRTT, etc.) on the PSU message board that knows better than him.
Clearly CJF does not know what he's talking about!!
 
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