The 2023 rules changes are out and there's only one major change. It's on enalty enforcement so it's not something that most people will notice. Coaches will certainly notice.
From now on, most offensive fouls that occur behind the line of scrimmage will be enforced from that line (previous spot) instead of the spot of the foul. Here's how that changes things: Say it's 1st and 10, A QB scrambles around and a blocker holds deep in the backfield, 8 yards behind the line. Previously, that would have made it 1st and 28 after enforcement. Now it's 1st and 20. The committee has discussed this chage for a couple years and felt like a common foul would be insurmountable drive killers in situations like this. This changge has been part of the survey of coaches and oddicials regarding possible changes for a couple of years and I knew momentum was building toward this change.
Fould for illegal kicking and batting and illegal paricipation are still going to be penalized from the spot of the foul (make sense, but how often do you see those?) he release didn't mention intentional grounding but I can see that being tweaked.
It does change one thing with intentional grounding. making a needed change to the rule change from last year that added an exception to the intentional gronuding rule if the passer was outside the free blocking zone and the ball made it past the line of scrimmage. The change says that this exception is only given to the player who receives the snap. While I didn't see it happen (surprisingly), the previos rule allowed a runnign back (player who took a handoff) to ground the ball if he was caught behind the line. No longer.
It's no coincidence that both these rules changes bring the high school code more in line with college football rules
NFHS Rules changes
From now on, most offensive fouls that occur behind the line of scrimmage will be enforced from that line (previous spot) instead of the spot of the foul. Here's how that changes things: Say it's 1st and 10, A QB scrambles around and a blocker holds deep in the backfield, 8 yards behind the line. Previously, that would have made it 1st and 28 after enforcement. Now it's 1st and 20. The committee has discussed this chage for a couple years and felt like a common foul would be insurmountable drive killers in situations like this. This changge has been part of the survey of coaches and oddicials regarding possible changes for a couple of years and I knew momentum was building toward this change.
Fould for illegal kicking and batting and illegal paricipation are still going to be penalized from the spot of the foul (make sense, but how often do you see those?) he release didn't mention intentional grounding but I can see that being tweaked.
It does change one thing with intentional grounding. making a needed change to the rule change from last year that added an exception to the intentional gronuding rule if the passer was outside the free blocking zone and the ball made it past the line of scrimmage. The change says that this exception is only given to the player who receives the snap. While I didn't see it happen (surprisingly), the previos rule allowed a runnign back (player who took a handoff) to ground the ball if he was caught behind the line. No longer.
It's no coincidence that both these rules changes bring the high school code more in line with college football rules
NFHS Rules changes
