On Sunday night, the Detroit Lions tried to finish off their opening drive against the Kansas City Chiefs with a trick play. David Montgomery took a direct snap, threw it over to quarterback Jared Goff, who stumbled his way into the end zone for a 1-yard touchdown. After nearly two minutes of conferring, though, the officials determined Goff had committed an illegal motion on the play.
You can see the full explanation of the call here, but the short story is that Goff had established himself as an under-center quarterback when he stopped right behind center Graham Glasgow and even touched him on the backside. While he is then allowed to go in motion, he must stop for at least a second before the ball is snapped. That did not happen.
Lions coach Dan Campbell was clearly too frustrated to talk about the play after the game, offering just a brief explanation for what happened.
“It doesn’t matter if I agree or disagree,” Campbell said at the time. “I know it came from New York, and they said he never stopped, he stayed in motion, he can’t stay in motion. That was that. That had no bearing on the game. We lost by 13 points.”
In the past, Campbell has said he regularly runs trick plays by the officials before the game so that they are prepared to officiate them properly. I asked Campbell if this was the case for Sunday’s trick play, and if, at any point, he was told the play was legal/illegal the way they were practicing it. Campbell refused to answer that question outright, but he did take full responsibility for the mistake.
“Man, I don’t even want to talk about it. I don’t, and I’m sorry, Jeremy. It’s just a real sore spot,” Campbell said. “I told the team, man, I take full responsibility for that. I do. Players did exactly what they were supposed to do. (Jared) Goff did exactly what we told him. David (Montgomery) did, and I will take that. You’ve got to make it very clear where you are, and I did not do that. I told them I take responsibility for that.”
That matches what Goff said after the game, as well. Because it was clear the quarterback did not understand the rules as they were applied on the play.
“I’ve never heard this, but they were saying that as close as I was to the center, that then declares me as a quarterback, and then I can’t go in motion,” Goff said. “I was under the impression that it was if my hands were under center. That’s a new version of the rule that I had never heard of, and I think a lot of our coaches had never heard of. If that is the rule, then I guess we just need to do a little bit more research on that.”
So in the end, it appears the Lions just didn’t understand the rule properly. What remains unclear is whether Detroit got any guidance from officials before executing the play.
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