Can You Grab in Football Defense?

Gridiron football or North American football is a catch-all term that includes American football, Canadian football, and a number of derivative games such as touch and flag football. Each game included under the term of "football" has its own set of rules as dictated by the organization that oversees it or through the common consensus of its players. In official rather than informal games between friends, or between college and professional football, players on the defense are only permitted to grab players thought to be carrying the ball, and, even then, they are limited in where they can grab.

Instructions

    • 1

      Learn the rules by which the football game will be played before you play. For example, an informal game of touch football between friends is unlikely to tolerate any incidences of grabbing; whereas, a game based on the rules of a footballing organization will likely have rules already in place to deal with such situations.

    • 2

      Determine where and for how long the player was grabbed because this can make a difference under certain football rule sets. For example, in American football, a player grabbing another player's face mask for longer periods is penalized in a harsher manner than incidental grabs.

    • 3

      Determine if the act violates the rules. For instance, in American football, a defensive player cannot grab an offensive player because that counts as a holding foul unless the defensive player is grabbing onto an offensive player with the ball so as to tackle that player.