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Indianapolis Colts President Bill Polian: Sentiment against feigning injury not as strong as before
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Indianapolis Colts President Bill Polian
Michael Conroy/AP Photo
Indianapolis Colts President Bill Polian vividly recalls a time when the general feeling around the NFL was it was very much not OK to feign injury.
As Polian sees it, that's not quite the case any more.
Polian on his weekly radio show on Monday evening addressed the issue of opposing players feigning injuries to slow the Colts' no-huddle offense. He said while he had no proof the San Francisco 49ers --or any team had done so -- circumstantial evidence suggests that over the past decade, “it has happened to us fairly frequently.”
“First of all, I can not tell you whether or not any player is or is not feigning an injury,” Polian said on his weekly radio show on 97.1 Hank FM a day after the Colts moved to 7-0 with an 18-14 victory over the San Francisco 49ers.
“You have to draw your own conclusions on that. I can tell you from first-hand experience there is a rule on the book that precludes and makes it illegal to feign injuries.”
PART II OF POLIAN SHOW REVIEW: HERE.
PART III OF POLIAN SHOW REVIEW. HERE.
Polian gleaned the experience of which he speaks while the general manager with the Buffalo Bills in January of 1989.
The Bills, Polian recalled were to play the Cincinnati Bengals in the AFC Championship Game. A week before, in an AFC Division Playoff, Seattle Seahawks Head Coach Chuck Knox had nose tackle Joe Nash feign injury on “about six plays or more.”
The reason: to slow down the Cincinnati Bengals' “Sugar Huddle,” a scheme Polian called “dubiously ethical” in which the Bengals would huddle on the sidelines with 13 or 14 players, then line up for the play with about 10 seconds on the play clock.
“It was obvious he [Nash] was feigning injury and Seattle didn't make any bones abut the fact that he was feigning injury,” Polian recalled. “hey were simply using a tactic to prevent what they believed was unethical behavior on the part of the Bengals. Commissioner Rozelle was very upset about it.”
The week before the title game, Polian said Rozelle made it clear there would be no “Sugar Huddle” in the game and no injury feigning, either.
“He got an affirmation from both clubs that that's the way the game would be played,” Polian said. “Commissioner Rozelle was an extremely persuasive individual. He made the point that he did not feel that either of those tactics belonged in the game and that he was going to make sure they didn't pop up in the ball game. And he did. At that point in time, it was considered unethical to feign an injury in order to gain a competitive advantage.
“Given what has happened circumstantially for the last four or five years to us on more than a few occasions I would say that's probably not the way the league views it now although the Competition Committee did discuss it.”
Polian, a member of the Competition Committee, said the issue has been discussed in recent years.
“The rule is already on the books that you can't do it, so it would have to be a point of emphasis,” Polian said. “We didn't get to that point simply because time precluded it. But Mike Holmgren who then a member of the committee made the point he thought it was extremely unethical to do so. We sort of left it there. It's happened to us fairly frequently. Whether players are injured or not I can't tell. It happened three times Sunday by my count. All three appeared to be cramps. I don't know what the motivation was. You'll have to draw your own conclusions.
“Clearly, at least in my view, the proscription against it – the feeling that it was not tactically OK to do – is not quite as strong in the league as it used to be and that's sad.”
Polian said while it is perhaps difficult for officials to determine if a player is injured, “if the officials have a mechanism to make sure it doesn't not a occur on a regular basis, then they can do something about it.”
“But it's up to the league and to a certain extent the Competition Committee to give them that mechanism,” Polian said. “I don't know if there's a will to do that. There certainly is not within the officiating department. Whether there is any will to do it outside the officiating remains to be seen.
“I think it's fair to say – without making any judgments on who's hurt and who's not hurt – that the feeling that that tactic is out of bounds is not quite as strong as it used to be.”
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MAGNIFICENT SEVENS: WEEKLY COLTS THOUGHTS . . .
Magnificent Seven I: Seven training camp thoughts and observations
Magnificent Seven II: On the Colts' defensive tackle position and WR Reggie Wayne
Magnificent Seven III: On the Colts' running backs and offensive line
Magnificent Seven IV: On the Colts' offense, OG Ryan Lilja and WR Anthony Gonzalez
Magnificent Seven V: On S Melvin Bullitt and QB Peyton Manning
Magnificent Seven VI: On RB Donald Brown and the start of the season . . . at last
Magnificent Seven VII: On WR Reggie Wayne, the OL and blitzing
Magnificent Seven VIII: On WR Reggie Wayne, QB Peyton Manning and DE Dwight Freeney
Magnificent Seven IX: On DE Robert Mathis, S Bob Sanders and DE Dwight Freeney
Magnificent Seven X: On QB Peyton Manning's start and life without DT Ed Johnson
Magnificent Seven XI: On RB rotation, DE Dwight Freeney and S Bob Sanders
Magnificent Seven XII: On WR Reggie Wayne, TE Dallas Clark and running game
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