The Big 12 May be Cracking Down on the ‘Horns Down’ Gesture

I’m a Longhorns fan and I think this is just a tad bit ridiculous.

The Dallas Morning News is reporting that earlier this week during Big 12 Media Days, Big 12 coordinator of officials Greg Burks had this to say when asked whether or not the “Horns Down” gesture will be a penalty this upcoming season:

Let me put it this way: if you do a Horns Down to a Texas player as an opponent, that’s probably going to be a foul. If you turn to your crowd and do a Horns Down, you’re not taunting an individual or an opponent, so it probably won’t be a foul.

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Okay, so yes, it is taunting. But I’ve never been in favor of penalizing players for taunting. My belief is that if players don’t want to be taunted, they should do everything in their power to shut the other player down and not give them a reason to taunt.

Another reason I’m not in favor of the change is that there’s a fine line between taunting and celebrating, which makes it a judgment call on behalf of the official. For instance, I don’t see how anyone could consider spiking the football to be taunting, but there are some who do.

I’ll be the first to admit that it irritates me when someone flashes the “Horns Down” when they find out I’m a Texas fan. My response is typically to tell them they should get their own hand gesture.

Of course, most, if not all of the universities here in Texas have their own hand gesture. But they would rather disrespect UT than represent their own school.

Which tells me they hate us because they ain’t us.