Most of the wind appears to have been taken out of the sails of a proposed rule change in college football that would implement a 10-second buffer between the start of the play clock and when the ball could be snapped. The rule was universally panned the minute it was first reported and has continued to hemorrhage support.
No other sport lambasts absurdities like college football. The college game's rabid fan base of state school alums with an affinity for Natural Light makes it a fertile ground for bitingly funny commentary.
Following in the steps of Nebraska Head Coach Bo Pelini interacting with his Twitter alter-ego, the Arizona football department mixed the two things college football fans love, no-huddle and 90s nostalgia, to spread, shred, and slam the final nail into the coffin of the proposed rule:
Interestingly, having Arizona head coach Rich Rodriquez star in a savvy "Speed" spoof/PSA wouldn't have been enough to squash this dumb and self-serving rule change. Rich Rod is largely credited with introducing the no-huddle to major Division I ball, so obviously his stance is biased.
No, the man responsible for killing the rule was the coach who would've had the most to gain. The rule's supporters claimed the no-huddle endangered "player safety," the magic words du jour for ginning up support from a media hungry for another anti-football crusade.
The man who cried wolf most loudly was unpopular Arkansas head coach Bret Bielema. He linked the no-huddle to the unfortunate passing of Cal defensive lineman Ted Agu, who died during this winter's workout period. Bielema's comments were made without any direct knowledge of the cause of Agu's death, and he was appropriately crushed by Berkeley's administration.
Some coaches are attempting to find a halfway point between Rodriquez and Bielema. Auburn head coach Guz Malzahn is proposing to postpone the vote on the rule to the 2015 off-season, so the rules committee can assemble the data necessary to make such a fundamental change to the game.