Quote:
Originally Posted by Hayneplane
To me I feel that any team that truly mastered lateral plays would shred defensive schemes and run up points quickly.
If there is a significant aerodynamic difference between an NFL football and a rugby football then this might diminish my next point but my view on laterals is that nfl players don’t use a throwing technique that has any consistent accuracy as they mostly push the ball with one arm or wildly fling it as if it’s a bomb about to explode in their hand. The underarm two handed pass swinging through from shoulder through elbows pointing to where your throw target is is a much more robust technique for powerful and accurate passes.
Granted the amount of times it was a good call to attempt it might be too low to invest the time in upskilling all your players to be able to do it but in tight finish it might be a real difference maker.
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Unfortunately, while a cool thing to imagine, there is no place for consistent laterals schematically that have any real impact on the game. We can already see how laterals are done at the line of scrimmage: option plays are hardly new or uncommon. While useful, they aren't anything game breaking.
So the only other level this can be groundbreaking is in the passing game, and here is where laterals run counter to NFL strategy. In order to lateral you obviously need two players, but scheming a nice gain in football is generally designed around getting a player in space with as few people around as possible. You don't want Kelce running routes with Rice 5 yards away ready for a lateral, that's just inviting problems. Couple that with the fact that unlike in Rugby, the defense is always at a fairly large advantage tackling wise given the Oline and probably QB are out of the play once the ball is thrown down field, and you are going to have to find a lateral play that can attack 4 or so vs 6-8 guys. So even if the lateral works, it's probably not going for some huge gain. Ultimately there is a reason kelce has done this like 4 times in hundreds of catches in his career. It's just not a viable NFL strategy to consistently do and spend time on practicing.