Illegal Kicks

Amarillo Chapter TASO Football

• Legal and Illegal Kick (FR-50)• A legal kick is a punt, drop kick or place kick

made according to the rules by a player of Team A before a change of team possession.

• Kicking the ball in any other manner is illegal (A.R. 6-1-2-I).

• Illegal Kicks– A punt from beyond the neutral zone (6-3-10c)– Using an illegal tee (6-3-10d)– When any devie is used to mark the spot of a

scrimmage placekick or elevate the ball (6-3-10d)– A free kick made from outside the hashmarks or

illegally elevated (2-15-4l)– A return kick (6-3-10b)

• Illegally kicking the ball is not the same as an illegal kick.

• Illegally kicking the ball means kicking it in a manner not allowed by the rules-how the ball is kicked. – (2-15-1) (FR-50)Kicking the ball is intentionally

striking the ball with the knee, lower leg or foot.

• An illegal kick is one of the rare penalties:– live ball foul that kills the bEXAMPLE:

From a legal scrimmage kick formation, A49 receives the snap and, under a heavy rush, eludes tacklers, runs beyond the neutral zone and punts the ball.

RULING: Illegal Kick. , but this is not illegally kicking the ball. The ball is dead at the instant of the kick. The 5-yard penalty is enforced from the spot of the kick AND includes loss of down.

• Illegally Kicking the ball

Example: Team A snaps the ball at the Team A 30 yard line. The snap rolls along the ground and A49, in a legal scrimmage kick formation tries to pick up the ball. A49 realizes he cannot avoid the rush and kicks the ball at the 20 yard line, while it is rolling along the ground.

• RULING– This is NOT an illegal kick. It is a backward pass

and a foul for illegally kicking the ball, be we DO NOT have a legal kick.

– If the ball is inadvertently kicked in an attempt to obtain possession, it is a muff and not a foul.

– The penalty is a 15-yard penalty, loss of down. In this scenario Team B would have 2 options. Take the result of the play, or ½ the distance first and goal for Team B.