Snap Clap Confusion Continues To Cause Issues For Cardinals

[Big Red]

MINNEAPOLIS – It wasn’t Kyler Murray this time that received the penalty flag, but backup Brett Hundley – yet the Cardinals are as perplexed as ever to what constitutes a legal snap clap and what does not.


“I was really shocked,” said Hundley, who twice was flagged by referee Walt Anderson for a false start in Saturday’s 20-9 loss to the Vikings, after the Cardinals and the NFL had extensive discussions previously about what was legal and what was not. “I don’t know what to tell you. I know us and coach, we are all trying to figure this out, but …”


Hundley gave a wistful chuckle. “I’m confused. I’m just … I don’t know.”


Coach Kliff Kingsbury looked frustrated when the penalties occurred late in the first half. He said he didn’t get much of an explanation although “I really didn’t seek one.”


“I try not to let it bother me too much,” Kingsbury said. “I understand it’s new and everybody is working through it, and I think we’ll come to a logical place with it.”


Murray didn’t use the snap clap Saturday, using instead a leg lift for a silent count, a mechanism used throughout the NFL. But when Hundley went to the clap, things quickly changed. Hundley said he was told in part that his hands have to be in front of his body prior to the clap, but that it was difficult because “when you clap, your hands are naturally outside of you.”


“I’m confused, when other quarterbacks can yell ‘hut, hut hut…’ or even being able to clap without getting the ball,” Hundley said.


Kingsbury said the Cardinals will work with multiple kinds of cadences in terms of snapping the ball.


In a pool report, referee Walt Anderson said conversations between officials, the league and the Cardinals hopefully will help clear up the confusion.


"What we always look for are motions or actions that simulate the start of the play and I just felt like those two actions by the quarterback did just that -- they simulated the start of the play and the ball wasn't snapped, so we had a false start," Anderson said.

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