Rule Changes
Death, taxes, and … rule changes?
If you play football or practice law or are involved in law enforcement, rule changes certain.
I confess that I don’t love changes. Change isn’t good; only good change is good. Bad change is bad, and change is just change. But like changes or not, we need to adjust to them.
I’ll largely forego my criticism of these changes and save it for another space, but let’s talk about some dramatic changes that have happened in football and the law over recent years.
As time has gone on, there have been many football rule changes that target certain kinds of hits in order to enhance player safety. Many of these changes have come swiftly and dramatically, and we see so many examples of players struggling to adjust to the new rules. I don’t agree with many of these changes. At all. But it doesn’t matter. We have to change how we coach it and how players execute it.
Hits that wouldn’t have even raised an eyebrow when I played now can not only draw a flag and 15-yard penalty, but they can actually get players suspended. And especially for a generation of players taught under the old rules, holding back rather than making a highlight-level hit becomes difficult.
Rule changes have come swiftly off the field too. For example, in college sports, we have seen the revolutionary advent of NIL and revenue sharing that essentially turn college players into pros. Like it or not, it’s here. And athletes need to learn how to adjust and take advantage of the rules without harming themselves – because there actually is a lot of danger that comes with what everyone heralds as a past-due development.
Any time a new market opens up to unregulated money, the floodgates don’t just allow entry to good stuff; plenty of bad actors will flow through the gate also seeking to exploit college athletes – the softest of soft targets. (Btw, this is why schools and athletes need us at Neff Strategies – to vet the backgrounds of business entities seeking to do business with athletes).
In my early days of being an AUSA, law enforcement agents would ask me if they could put a tracking device on a car in say, the Walmart parking lot. I said, “yes, of course. People don’t have a reasonable expectation of privacy while traveling on open roads in public.” If the police can follow and observe with their eyes, they can use a tracker to do them same thing.
Then in 2012, the Supreme Court said, “not so fast, my friend” and held that police need to get warrants based on probable cause before putting a tracker on vehicles. United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (2012). I don’t agree with that case. At all. But it doesn’t matter. We had to adjust how we advised police.
Pic: Vid of one of my hits against a WR for Dartmouth in 1987. Caused and recovered fumble (clip starts with me on bottom right of screen in white jersey). What do you think? Would it be called “targeting” today?
