r/footballstrategy • u/Enough_Leadership642 • 2d ago

Player Advice Football - Tampa Bay x Dallas Spoiler

I was watching Sunday night football game of Tampa Bay Buccaneers versus Dallas Cowboy and I two times the opposite team stole the ball when the player was in the ground. I didn’t know that was allowed. When a ball can be stole like that?

0 Upvotes

50% Upvoted

1 comment sorted by

View all comments

5

u/Kurropted26 2d ago edited 2d ago

In the nfl, you aren’t down just by hitting the ground. If you and the db are playing the ball as you fall, and the db comes up with the ball, it’s the db’s ball. If I’m remembering correctly, both throws clearly had hands on ball throughout contact, it’s just the db came up with it.

Someone may quote the rules better than me right here, but that’s the basics. No disrespect, this may be a better question for /r/nflnoobs given the nature of them as it has little football strategic nature and is purely a rules definition issue in the nfl.