GamecockSeven
02-19-2008, 06:58 PM
Great article with info on the origins of why rules require seven men on the line of scrimmage...
The basis for the seven-man rule (it is always seven men on the line of scrimmage for the offense and field goal/PAT/punting units, in all circumstances, never six or eight men) is so ingrained in modern strategy that it's barely mentioned, even though it's at the heart of every system, formation and non-trick play devised for the last hundred years. A lot of fans probably don't understand what makes an "illegal formation" illegal, or why it's illegal to begin with.
The reason: death. Or something like that, according to the turn-of-the-century prohibitionists who attacked football in the same vein as poverty and alcohol. Most teams by 1889 (the year after the rugby-influenced rule restricting any teammate from running in front of the ballcarrier was rescinded) used some variation of the slow-moving "V wedge" on kickoffs, which functioned something like a World War I trench attack looking for a breakthrough in opposing defensive lines. Kick returns still employ the wedge concept, but the really dangerous innovation was Harvard coach Lorin E. Deland's "fling wedge," described thusly (http://www.the-game.org/history-flyingwedge.htm) in a game against Yale in 1892...
http://www.sundaymorningqb.com/story/2008/2/14/22223/3405
The basis for the seven-man rule (it is always seven men on the line of scrimmage for the offense and field goal/PAT/punting units, in all circumstances, never six or eight men) is so ingrained in modern strategy that it's barely mentioned, even though it's at the heart of every system, formation and non-trick play devised for the last hundred years. A lot of fans probably don't understand what makes an "illegal formation" illegal, or why it's illegal to begin with.
The reason: death. Or something like that, according to the turn-of-the-century prohibitionists who attacked football in the same vein as poverty and alcohol. Most teams by 1889 (the year after the rugby-influenced rule restricting any teammate from running in front of the ballcarrier was rescinded) used some variation of the slow-moving "V wedge" on kickoffs, which functioned something like a World War I trench attack looking for a breakthrough in opposing defensive lines. Kick returns still employ the wedge concept, but the really dangerous innovation was Harvard coach Lorin E. Deland's "fling wedge," described thusly (http://www.the-game.org/history-flyingwedge.htm) in a game against Yale in 1892...
http://www.sundaymorningqb.com/story/2008/2/14/22223/3405