site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3937 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for February 12, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

4
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

The Eagles, through a mix of having essentially the pro-bowl offensive line, a QB who squats 600lbs and will do anything to win, and tremendous full team buy-in, call a QB sneak and get 2-3 guys behind Hurts who push him into the line scrum style. Hurts is the ball carrier, but in a very real sense he just curls up and becomes the ball, with 2-3 guys behind and 2-3 guys in front doing the actual moving.

It amounted to a cheat code for a lot of the season to get 1-2 yards automatically. Where that might get banned:

  1. Physical toll, or a public perception of the physical toll. It's actually relatively unlikely to result in injury, it is the big open field hits that do the worst damage, but it looks brutal and the NFL might not like that. QBs who aren't physical specimens might or might not use the NFLPA to bring this up.

  2. Changing strategy. The Eagles had a LOT of boring wins, part of which was that they could run the ball for 3 yards on 1st-3rd downs, and then push on 4th. I think 4 down football makes the game more exciting personally, but I could see teams complaining that it allowed the Eagles to just sit on 7-14 point leads and smother the game rather than play aggressively or give the ball back to the other team.

  3. Aesthetics. Some NFL magnates might not like how it looks. Just flat out think it is ugly, unentertaining, bad for the TV brand.

Its a maul rather than a scrum, probably (maul has a player with the ball being shoved forward by his pack, scrum has the ball at the feet of the players while the packs try to push each other back). I think the current rules for mauls are once forward momentum is arrested you have 5 seconds to make another push or work the ball free or they call the ball dead.

A ruck would be interesting in American Football (player goes to ground, ball behind him and your forwards push over the top, basically), and maybe legal? You can choose to fumble the ball gently behind you while your offensive line push over and you recover the controlled fumble from behind them? You'd have to drop the ball before you went down, unlike in rugby where you can place it behind you, generally.

Changing strategy. The Eagles had a LOT of boring wins, part of which was that they could run the ball for 3 yards on 1st-3rd downs, and then push on 4th. I think 4 down football makes the game more exciting personally, but I could see teams complaining that it allowed the Eagles to just sit on 7-14 point leads and smother the game rather than play aggressively or give the ball back to the other team.

One could argue that this is just because 4 downs make football boring...

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats