Cincinnati Bengals: Comparing Huber’s To Other Great Fakeouts

Hester & Knox Trick Green Bay

This one has stuck in my mind the way few plays do. We’ve seen plays using the same plan as this multiple times in recent years, but this was the first instance I remember seeing of this sort of design.

What Makes It Great

• Completely baffled the coverage unit. Devin Hester and the Bears’ return unit set up their blocking on the left side of the field for a normal-looking punt return; meanwhile, Johnny Knox had been tracking the ball’s actual trajectory and set himself up under the ball. He caught it while Hester faked a catch and return, and it took a dozen yards before Green Bay understood what had happened.
• Chicago absolutely needed a score to have a last-ditch shot at taking this game to overtime or winning it outright; the apparent score here seemingly took a 27-17 deficit down to 27-24 (assuming PAT make).
• Green Bay’s punter realized what happened and was the only Packers player able to make any attempt at stopping Knox. He did make a valiant effort to fight through blocks and position himself well, but the blocking was good enough to prevent him from keeping Knox in front of him.
• Knox was able to finish his return strong enough that he jumped through the punter’s last-ditch tackle attempt with ease to reach the endzone.

What Holds It Back

• Ended up not counting due to a holding penalty
• Even if it worked, probably came too late to change the expected result of the game

Final Verdict: 3/10

Everything about the way the play turned out was incredible, except for the unfortunate hold which upended the expected score.

The design here has since been used in different variants by multiple teams across the league, with many of them actually succeeding with no penalty flags to be seen. Those teams should thank Chicago’s special teams coaches from 2011 for it. Because this particular instance didn’t end up counting within it’s game, however, it can only rate so highly.