One of the more unsettling trends in football is for players — whether it be on the college or pro level — to go out of their way in an attempt to draw a flag with a flop. Tuesday night's Guaranteed Rate Bowl between Kansas and UNLV gave us our latest, most glaring example.
Ironically, the blatant flop attempt, which felt like the overdone theatrics often seen in NBA games, was performed by Jayhawks cornerback Cobee Bryant.
Here's a look at the dramatic scene on the Kansas sideline:
Watch #47 Kansas come in with the water bottle squirt after the flop ? pic.twitter.com/e98EaOMM3i
— HALL of GOATS (@GOATS_hall) December 27, 2023
Now, was it necessary for UNLV's outstandingly named lineman, Tiger Shanks, to slap at Bryant's helmet when the two were nearly all the way off the white paint? Absolutely not. But that also didn't mean it was time for the freshman DB's impromptu acting debut.
After being viewed a few times in the replay, the noticeable delay between initial contact and the flop looks like a comical, carbon copy of something NBA fans have gotten so used to seeing from star players such as LeBron James — frequently referred to as "LeFlop" — as well as notorious flopping maestro Luka Doncic.
But, as already mentioned, this has absolutely become a "thing" in football, and it has certainly not been limited to obscure bowl games. This one goes all the way up the ladder to the NFL and its very best players, such as Christian McCaffrey.
CMC selling the flop is classic ? pic.twitter.com/Gnr44J5qPR
— OurSF49ers (@OurSf49ers) December 3, 2023
CMC's attempt to get a flag thrown on Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox was so obvious he actually had an NFL referee smiling and laughing, and even jokingly giving the star running back a pat on the helmet.
In all honesty, that's really a victory all by itself. If you've gone ahead and made the decision to draw a 15-yard penalty and done so in such ridiculous fashion that a ref has loosened up to the point of outward laughter, it's time to get back to the lab and work on the art of flopping.
Same goes for Cobee Bryant, whose "satellite delay" collapse was on a similar level of nonsense. But sometimes, there's a glass-half-full outlook for these situations, as it inspired Kansas teammate Jacoby Davis (No. 47) to turn his Gatorade bottle into a squirt gun as a relatively harmless form of retaliation.
The Kansas Jayhawks went on to win the illustrious Guaranteed Bowl, defeating the Runnin' Rebels 49-36.
