You know how pesky fleas are, don’t you? They flit around on your dog or cat and as soon as you try to nail one down in one location, it appears in another. You never know where it’s going to end up! Now try to imagine that flea as a football and you’ll start to see why this play is named after the little critter. Like a flea, the football is tossed or ‘flicked’ forward then backward then forward again between a few different players to confuse the opposing team (the defense). When the defense watches this action, they never quite know what’s happening because the ball is tossed so fast and through so many hands. Who’s doing the tossing? Well, as always (actually, almost always), the quarterback receives the ball first, and then acts like it’s a pesky flea by flicking it to a runner. Who doesn’t run – very far! Instead, he tosses the ball back to the quarterback who now flings it way down the field to a receiver.

A safety is one of those football events that takes just a second. Then it’s over. Then there are two extra points on the board. And you’re left shaking your head thinking, “What just happened?” Well, any time a team has the ball (the offense), they love to take it down the field and into their opponent’s end zone for a touchdown. But sometimes the opposing defense does a really good job of pushing the offense back to where they started, closer to their own end zone. If the defense pushes the offense into that end zone, and the person who’s holding the ball goes down to where his knee touches the ground, it’s a safety and the defense scores 2 points for making that happen. Talk about being grounded!

Not even football players can predict the future. So when a quarterback lines up for the next play, he may not like what he sees. Maybe the defensive players lined up in a way the quarterback didn’t expect and he knows darn well the play his coach gave him won’t work. So what does he do? He scours his brain to come up with a play he thinks will work, and shouts it out to the other players on his team before the ball is hiked. It’s called an audible because that’s how the play is being communicated to his team members on the field.

The clock is ticking. There are literally only a few more seconds left to play in the game. The team that’s behind has the ball. It’s their last chance to score and hopefully pull ahead of the other team. What choice does the quarterback have? He can’t make a play that only moves them a few yards. He’s got to get the ball down the field and into the end zone. It’s the team’s last chance, their only hope. The ball is snapped to the quarterback and he takes a few steps back. Several members of his team run down field as fast as possible, holding their hands up in the air. The quarterback pulls his arm back and throws the ball as far as he possibly can into the end zone and hopefully into the arms of one of his teammates. That’s a hail mary. It’s a one-shot, long shot you have to go for when the clock is ticking down your fate, when you’ve only got a prayer of a chance to win. In the 1984 Boston College vs Miami playoff game, quarterback Doug Flutie had 6 seconds and half a football field to get into the end zone. He threw a pass into the hands of one of his receivers and they won the game. You can watch a video replay of this amazing play here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-qkpsygNYo

A Wide Receiver (WR) is an offensive player on a football team. They’re extremely agile and their hands seem to be covered in Velcro because they can grab a ball out of thin air and hang on to it for dear life. Their primary job is to break free and run down the field to catch passes from the Quarterback. These guys are like Superman–they can leap tall buildings to catch a pass. They can throw themselves into a horizontal dive to grab the ball before it hits the ground. And have you ever seen one catch a ball close to the sidelines? Like a ballet dancer, they’ll go up on point, dragging both feet to make sure their catch is in bounds. Whew! They simply defy gravity. If you see replays or highlights of a game, it’s probably the Wide Receiver making a spectacular catch! Before the ball is hiked, WRs–also called just Receivers or Wide Outs–line up on the outside ends of the offensive line. Like other NFL players, they have to wear specific numbers on their jerseys. Look for numbers 80-89 and 10-19 to see some real magic. (Here’s one in action  http://www.rstripod.com/football.htm.) If the Wide Receiver is not asked to catch a pass, he might be asked to block for a runner. While helpful, that just isn’t as exciting, is it?