This is Un-American (Or Should Be), by D. W. O'Dell Options

[MediaBlvd Magazine]

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By D. W. O’Dell

I am shocked – shocked - by the news I read on ESPN last week. Little in the world of sports shocks me any more - drug scandals, wives threatening to sleep with their husbands’ teammates, wives giving husbands permission to sleep with groupies . . . but this news item shook me to the very foundation of my being.

They’ve banned the fumblerooskie.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, the fumblerooskie is a play where the quarterback takes the snap from the center, immediately places the football on the ground, and then fakes a running play in one direction; a guard then picks up the football and runs in the opposite direction. The play was used of note in the 1984 Orange Bowl; the last college fumblerooskie was in a 1992 Nebraska/Colorado game.

The NFL (the No Fun League as it is widely known) banned the play in the 1960s. That was fine because the real fun was hearing college football announcer, Keith Jackson, saying the word, “Fumblerooskie!” at college games. Then the NCAA banned it in 1993. But at least our children were safe, right? Right?

No more. The National Federation of High School Associations has followed the lead of the NFL and the NCAA and banned the play. The assistant director for the NFSHSA, Jerry Diehl, was quoted as saying the new rule would “eliminate confusion” during a ballgame as the fumblerooskie placed a burden on officials.

Gee, we don’t want confusion during a football game, do we? Maybe the teams should exchange plays before the game. Maybe leagues should approve three running plays and three passing plays, and bar teams from running any other plays. Let’s get rid of the halfback option pass, the fake punt, and the play-action pass while we’re at it. Don’t even try and fathom the confusion caused by reverses, much less double reverses.

And flea flickers? Yeah.

What confuses referees is when leagues adopt more rules, like rules banning the fumblerooskie. Of course, rules are necessary; in the early days of football coaches would create trick plays like having receivers run out of bounds and then return to the field to catch a pass. Pushing the limits of the rules occasionally requires tweaking the rules when things go too far.

But recently the NFL has taken a lot of heat for poor officiating, and one oft-cited cause is the complexity of the football rulebook. When playoff games are decided by little-known provisions like the 'tuck rule,’ the outcome of games seems increasingly arbitrary. One game was decided by a player taking off his helmet after the play was over, an infraction to be sure but hardly one that should affect who wins and who loses.

There is also the fact that next season NFL referees will have a new set of guidelines to apply when deciding whether a touchdown celebration is “excessive.” I can’t wait for Terrell Owens and Chad Johnson to invent new dances to push the envelope on that rule . . .

Yes, sports should be fair and have rules, but they should also be fun. Trick plays like the fumblerooskie probably wouldn’t work in the modern NFL anymore, but why should high school offensive linemen be denied the opportunity to actually score a touchdown once in a while just for the sake of eliminating confusion?

As Richard Gere sang in the movi, Chicago, “Give ‘em the old razzle-dazzle.”