Understanding Hard-Hitting Rules

[mlmpetert]

Originally Posted by Mattyk

If he would have kept his head up and just hit him with his shoulder, perhaps there's a still a penalty, but I would bet there wouldn't have been a fine.

It's simple, see what you hit. Lowering your head is a guaranteed flag and fine. Just the way things are now.

What FRPLG is saying is that if he had his head up he would have made a helmet to helmet hit, which is illegal. I completely agree with FRPLG and also think that a helmet to helmet hit would be considered "worse" in the sense it would draw a larger fine. Honestly i dont think there was anything he could of done that would have stopped the receiver at or in the immediate area of the point of contact without being fined.

Does anyone know the rule around "leading with your head"? Is that actually anywhere in the rule book? I always thought leading with your head applied to helmet to helmet stuff.

While Robinson's helmet did grace Maclin's facemask the hit came from Robinson's shoulder to Maclin's arm/shoulder. And the rule he was fined under is the defenseless receiver rule, nothing around leading with his head. So even if he had his head up and somehow managed to not hit Maclin's helmet he would have been flagged and fined under the defenseless receiver rule.

I think he is guilty of the defenseless receiver rule, but as I stated above that rule is completely bs. If you dont want defenseless receivers to get hit hard make zone coverage’s illegal or have a offsetting penalty on QB's for leading the receiver into an unavoidable hit. If its a penalty on the QB then DB's will know they can completely let up and it wont matter because the pass is going to be called back, and if the DB goes through with the hit then fine him. Its not just the safety of the receiver, the defender often gets seriously hurt too.