Brian Kelly airs it out on blindside block call that fired him up on the sideline at officials

On3 imageby:Andrew Graham•09/25/22•

AndrewEdGraham

The hit that LSU linebacker Kolbe Fields laid on New Mexico’s Reco Hannah on a Tigers punt return late in the first quarter wasn’t particularly fearsome, but it’ll still drew a penalty for an illegal blindside block. It drew the ire of head coach Brian Kelly, too.

Along with wiping a Jack Bech punt return touchdown off the board, keeping the score at 10-0, Kelly felt it wasn’t actually a blindside hit. Hannah was running perpendicular to the sideline when Fields swooped in just upfield and delivered a hit squarely to Hannah’s side.

“So they called it blindside block,” Kelly said postgame. “And I took issue with the the fact that it was a ‘blindside’ block. A blindside block means he could not defend himself. I felt like he clearly saw it coming. He got his head across. And they just simply had a different interpretation.”

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Hits like the one Fields delivered on Saturday night — one Kelly argued should be allowed — have been more of an emphasis for elimination from the game. The penalty for it is a relatively recent addition and the adjustment has been varied, though the number of true blindside blocks has surely decreased since the rule change in 2019.

Players blocking back against the direction of the return is a tell for officials to throw a flag. That’s likely what caught Fields out on Saturday, leading to Kelly giving the refs an earful.

Kelly thinks the block that Fields made wasn’t on the blindside, and if it will be policed that tightly, things like punt returns are going to be eliminated, too.

“And I said if you take that block out of football, there won’t be punt returns. And I just felt — look, they won the argument because it’s their interpretation of what a blindside block is. I just didn’t, I didn’t agree with the call. And I wanted to make sure that they — I probably was beating a dead horse on the thing, but I wanted to make sure they heard me,” Kelly said.