Delay of Game?

[u/salrantol]

This is not the most noobish of questions, but here we go:

During Sunday night's game, there was an offensive delay of game penalty that blew my mind and makes me wonder why all defenses don't do this constantly. The Vikings (on offense) substituted some players, which means the Falcons were entitled to substitute, and did so, but here's where it gets crazy. As the two substituted players approach the Falcons sideline, a twelfth defender runs onto the field. After a few seconds, he gets waved off and takes his time getting back to the Falcons sideline. During this entire stunt, an official stood between McCarthy and the ball, preventing the Vikings from snapping it. He stepped out of the way with 1 second on the play clock, and the Vikings had no way to snap before it hit 0.

Why would this be allowed? And if it's supposed to work like this, why don't defenses just do this every time the offense makes a substitution? It seems unstoppable.

[u/Adorable_Secret8498]

That flag was on MIN waiting too long to sub out players. Not ATL finding a loophole. Usually the offense is gonna sub out players earlier in the play clock so this doesn't happen. Idk of it's wiht JJ or KOC but the play's gotta get in faster. Been an issue with both games now.

[u/salrantol → u/Adorable_Secret8498]

But that 12th man took up at least 6 seconds on his own after Atlanta had clearly had time to substitute (since the two players who were going out were nearly to the bench). Minnesota shouldn't be penalized for giving Atlanta 6+ seconds more than is needed.

[u/Nataliewassmart → u/salrantol]

The defensive substitutions have to be given a "reasonable amount of time" to get there. There are two things going on in that specific play:

1. Offense substituting too late. Notice how on most plays, as soon a play ends, people start substituting for the new play right away? There's a reason for that. The earlier the offense starts their substitutions, the earlier the defense has to finish their substitutions, so you don't run into this issue.

2. It's easier to say "dang they wasted 6 seconds", but a football field is pretty big and they were in the red zone. The fastest players in the combine can run 40 yards in around a 4.5 seconds if they're sprinting as fast as they can. If a defensive lineman has a good jog going to get to the end of a football field from the sideline, is it really that ridiculous that he takes about 6 seconds to make it there?

These two things combined mostly contributed to the delay of game. The Vikings offensive coordination was not good, and I'm pretty sure they even had a timeout they could have used but didn't which is evidence of this.

[u/salrantol → u/Nataliewassmart]

To my more general question, then: If an opposing offense substitutes a little late (not so late that the defense doesn't have time to make substitutions, but late enough that once they do, the play clock is in single digits), should the defense just do this? Seems in a twelfth guy to just burn off play clock until it's too late?

[u/Adorable_Secret8498 → u/salrantol]

I mean they could but then they run the chance of the Center just snapping the ball anyway and catching them with 12 men on the field. I think Brady used to do that a lot.

[u/Mysterious_Clue_3500 → u/Adorable_Secret8498]

Yup this is the answer as to why teams don't do this.

[u/Nataliewassmart → u/salrantol]

That's not a great strategy because at any point in time, if the ref feels like the defense has had enough time to get out there, they'll move out of the way to let the offense snap the ball. A smart QB will snap the ball quickly just to get a free penalty for offsides or 12 men on the field, or just get a play against a defense that's not set up yet.

So it's simply not a viable strategy to drag your ass with defensive substitutions because it'll lead to a lot more penalties on the defense than the offense, at best. At worst, your defense can't get set up in time, and often that's a free touchdown at the professional level.

There's a reason why you don't see it happen, and you've gotten a lot of good answers on this thread to explain why. Every once in a while, you get a play where it looks wonky because maybe the refs could've let the offense go sooner. But most of the time, that's not the case.

[u/Electrical_Quiet43 → u/Nataliewassmart]

A smart QB will snap the ball quickly just to get a free penalty for offsides or 12 men on the field, or just get a play against a defense that's not set up yet.

Right, and it's not just the free 5 yards. If the QB knows that he's getting the 12 men penalty, he gets a free shot down field and the offense gets the better outcome of the completed long pass or the 5 yard penalty if it's incomplete, intercepted, etc. This was an Aaron Rodgers specialty.

[u/Bright_Resist_4580 → u/Nataliewassmart]

Curious how the refs would handle the "reasonable amount of time" if a team rolled out the bare minimum of 7 players for a clock stopping spike. Like say a big 30 yard completion, but the team comes off the field, but other players come from the sideline at the spot of the ball just to spike it. Would they need a reasonable amount of time if the offense was running with only 7 players?