Personal Fouls

**mmi16** · 01-19-2016, 04:01 PM

Observations over several years and especially the 2015-2016 playoffs it appears that players have no respect for the 'Personal Foul' penalty.

Personal Fouls get called for actions that are outside the 'bounds of the game'.

Since it is a PERSONAL penalty, in addition to the 15 yards assessed against the team, the player committing the action should be disqualified from further participation in the game and potentially prevented from playing in a following game with loss of pay for all games in the Personal Foul Disqualified status.

It will only take one or two assessments per team for players to channel their aggression to the game instead of the cheap shot extracurricular activities that Personal Fouls are normally assessed on.

**lovefootball** · 01-19-2016, 04:12 PM

What you posted would definitely have avoided what happened in the Steeler/Bengals game. But getting refs to enforce it would be the problem. I believe fighting is a reason for ejection and that never happens from what I've see. You see the punch, the flag gets thrown, but no ejection.

The pay loss, bet the NFLPA would have something to say about that.

**Brtnder81** · 01-22-2016, 08:09 AM

I think 3 personal fouls in a game should be an ejection and 2 ejections in a season they are suspended for a game, 3rd ejection and suspended for 3 games and a 4th ejection 8 game suspension. if you get 2 suspensions then the player should start suspended for a game step for the following season

**JAB1985** · 01-22-2016, 08:18 AM

Originally Posted by mmi16

Observations over several years and especially the 2015-2016 playoffs it appears that players have no respect for the 'Personal Foul' penalty.

Personal Fouls get called for actions that are outside the 'bounds of the game'.

Since it is a PERSONAL penalty, in addition to the 15 yards assessed against the team, the player committing the action should be disqualified from further participation in the game and potentially prevented from playing in a following game with loss of pay for all games in the Personal Foul Disqualified status.

It will only take one or two assessments per team for players to channel their aggression to the game instead of the cheap shot extracurricular activities that Personal Fouls are normally assessed on.

Personal fouls are also for "safety rules", so hitting a QB a fraction late, or helmet to helmet that wasnt really, or hitting a WR after 1 step instead of two... gets you thrown out, suspended another game and fined automatically...

ill pass. Far too many Personal Fouls are timing issues in the NFL and fractions of a second from being a good play to punish so severely. How many times do we argue, and sometimes the league even admits, that calls were bad in those instances? Now you just lost a player, possibly game changing one, because of a bad call, instead of just losing 15 yards that you can at least try to recover from.

I dont think thats a viable approach. You can stop what happened in Cincy and with OBJ by simply having the refs standup to it more and actually call the penalties that clearly are.

**JAB1985** · 01-22-2016, 08:21 AM

Originally Posted by Brtnder81

I think 3 personal fouls in a game should be an ejection and 2 ejections in a season they are suspended for a game, 3rd ejection and suspended for 3 games and a 4th ejection 8 game suspension. if you get 2 suspensions then the player should start suspended for a game step for the following season

id sooner agree to something like that. I think 1 could be a mistake, 2 could be unlucky, 3 youre a knuckle head and should be out of the game. do that again then youre clearly a shit head.

problem with this scenario, is I think its very very rare for anybody to get 3 in a game, let alone multiple times, but I woudlnt have a problem with having it in place in case it did.

**The Fanatic** · 01-22-2016, 10:42 AM

As has already been said above, there's no way to be able to really enforce this due to the nature of some of the personal fouls.
Most are of the accidental nature with no intentions to commit. (I.E.- not showing intentional malice in his heart);)

Now if they were to start something like that regarding unsportsmanlike conduct penaltys I could potentially see a way to implement a rule or consequences for repeat offenders.

**CincyCat** · 01-22-2016, 09:40 PM

Originally Posted by JAB1985

Personal fouls are also for "safety rules", so hitting a QB a fraction late, or helmet to helmet that wasnt really, or hitting a WR after 1 step instead of two... gets you thrown out, suspended another game and fined automatically...

ill pass. Far too many Personal Fouls are timing issues in the NFL and fractions of a second from being a good play to punish so severely. How many times do we argue, and sometimes the league even admits, that calls were bad in those instances? Now you just lost a player, possibly game changing one, because of a bad call, instead of just losing 15 yards that you can at least try to recover from.

I dont think thats a viable approach. You can stop what happened in Cincy and with OBJ by simply having the refs standup to it more and actually call the penalties that clearly are.

Amen! I think the biggest issue for our players was having the bully punch you and get away with it so many times you say wtf. "I don't care if I get called for a PF, I'm gonna show this MF I ain't gonna put up with it no mo".

Maybe it will take another season for it to sink in, but the Bengals are going to lay the wood when Pitt. starts playing dirty. Let the chips fall. Refs, start doing your jobs and call it both ways.

**BlackSunday** · 01-24-2016, 05:53 PM

Been thinking about this issue over the course of the playoffs, where two different plays demonstrated the potential for (depending on your point of view) abuse or exploitation of the rules.

Note - the following considers only the yardage effects of penalties, not the deterrent effects of fines and suspensions.

1) The Amendola hit on the punt vs. KC was assessed for only two yards; in terms of win probability, the effect was negligible. On the other hand, injuring an opponent or making them lose their cool can have a pronounced effect on win probability, particularly if it takes place early in the game.

So the point here is: there may well be times when a cheap shot is beneficial, particularly early in the game and on a bad play. So, if your secondary is in the process of giving up a slow-developing TD (e.g., the Fitzgerald TD to win the game vs. GB), what is the win probability effect of roughing the QB? Fifteen yards assessed on the kickoff (i.e., the ball goes into the third row of the stands instead of just out of the end zone)? For that matter, what about when defending a first and ten at your own one?

For that matter, if such a situation is good for an individual cheap shot, then it might be even more effective for multiple fouls by different players on the same play.

I'm not sure what to conclude from this, but taking the perspective that the Amendola hit was a heads-up play (regardless of legality or "dirtyness") seems to open up a pretty nasty rabbit hole.

2) I missed the PIT-CIN playoff game, but caught the last 30 seconds on the radio and highlights. Thus, I don't know much of what went down earlier in the game. Burfict turning into a wrecking crew against the Slags may have cost the Bengals the game, but also prevented PIT from advancing further into the playoffs. In that sense, we saw something like the old strategic concept of Mutual Assured Destruction - you take us out, we'll still be able to take you out, too (albeit a week later). Obviously, deterrence can also apply at the one-on-one level (most of the time, at least).

So we've got two stories here - one potentially encouraging the strategic use of penalties, the other arguing that deterrence can sorta/kinda work in preventing bad conduct. But one thing that the two different situations may share is that off-field punishments such as fines and suspensions may lose their effectiveness as the playoffs progress.

Not quite sure what to make of this, other than moderate surprise that more playoff games don't degenerate into something like the end of either Slap Shot or Rollerball.

BS

**mmi16** · 02-06-2016, 09:38 PM

So now Goodell want players ejected after 2 Personal Fouls in a game.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com...proposed-rule/

**lovefootball** · 02-06-2016, 09:51 PM

Originally Posted by mmi16

So now Goodell want players ejected after 2 Personal Fouls in a game.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com...proposed-rule/

He should have the refs enforce the rule already in place for fighting, SMH. Seen plenty of punches thrown and no ejections. Players need to know that the rules in place are to be used for personal fouls and cheap shots to the head. College enforces it all the time.

Does Goodell need to look at how the NCAAA handles their players who take cheap shots? Think he should, LOL. Refs let it get to this point with players out of control and no enforcement to stop it.

Saw a comment about the Bengal -Pitt game being Gladiator like. Fight to win, SMH.

**stevez51** · 02-07-2016, 09:55 AM

College reviews PF's for blatant behavior. Like Bosa being tossed out of the Fiesta Bowl. The NFL looks at it being a competitive balance issue. OBJ should have been tossed in the Carolina game. His hit was blatant. But he was allowed to stay and caught a TD.