Last year the Seahawks were baffled by a piece of trickeration on a Rams punt return, where one player feigned as if he was about to catch it while Stedman Bailey actually caught the ball on the other side of the field, leading to a 90-yard punt return TD. The Hawks must have liked what they saw: They ran it today against the Bears:
Seahawks burn Bears with WHO’S GOT IT punt return trickeration
This is now the most popular play in football.
That’s Tyler Lockett pretending to catch the ball -- and really committing to the gig by falling over -- and Richard Sherman actually coming down with it, eventually being tracked down by Bears punter Pat O’Donnell.
The Bears had also tried to pull this off in 2011 when they had Devin Hester and Johnny Knox, but it got called back due to a holding call.
This is actually the second time we’ve seen this incredibly difficult-to-pull-off play in two days: Saturday night, Utah ran this play in their utterly dominant victory over Oregon, leading to a 69-yard TD for Boobie Hobbs:
It’s a tough play to pull off. For starters, the punt has to be far enough on one side of the field for the fake to work. Then the punt returner and faux punt returner have to correctly get to opposite sides of the field. Finally, the fake has to be convincing since the entire defense has to follow the right guy for it to work. That’s a lot of things!
CBS commentator Phil Simms mentioned he’d seen the play watching college football last night but added he “couldn’t remember which game.” That’s what we’re here for, Phil!
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SB Nation video archives: A trick punt return fakes out the Seahawks (2014)
