reviewable plays

The only changes I would like to see are, the down by contact rule, which is absolute nonesense, and if a challenge is inconclusive you should not be charged a time out, inconclusive mean's that the challenger could very well be right, but because of camera angle you can't tell, I believe that should be a wash, I then want younger referee's on the field, and they also have to be in top shape, they should have to pass a physical test, as well as an eye test, I don't know why we have guy's who can't get out of their own way, and probably can't pass an eye exam for a drivier's license, on the field decieding the outcome of games? It's like the NFL has gone to WWF for ref's.

with this new contact rule, interference is like holding. happens every play. imagine if holding was challengeable.

reviewable i think is good as long as its by the officials and on truly questionable calls.

Ok...
This is something that pisses me off because the damn game announcers do the same damn thing. The new contact rule (which isn't actually new at all...nor does it seem to have been enforced any more than normal) has very little to do with Pass Interference. Pass interference as we all know (especially Mr. Harris and Mr. Gardner) is interfering with the the rights of another player to attempt to catch a thrown ball. In essense whenever a ball is thrown one player may not physically prevent another eligible receiver from trying to catch to ball. The new/not exactly new contact rule pertains to preventing an eligible receiver from even getting open AFTER they have exited the 5 yard safety zone but PRIOR to a thrown ball. Inside that 5 yard zone the secondary can basically do perform any legal act of contact(IE: not holding) at any time.

Now contact DOES happen on just about any play but for the most part it is of the incidental and non-impeding type. The new enforcement is seeking to eliminate the absolute mauling(impeding with normally legal types of contact...again: not holding) of receivers after the 5 yard zone.

My whole point is that Pass Interference and Illegal Contact are not the same thing and should be treated differently. One can reasonably assume a player, who having been interfered with thus causing him to drop the ball, would have caught the ball and that seems like it should be reviewable since it's not really that subjective. I mean either they guy impeded him from catching the ball or he didn't. Illegal contact on the other hand doesn't allow you to assume a player would have caught a pass since the ball was never thrown his direction anyways.

I say PI should be the MOST reviewed play in all of football and it is a sham that it isn't even reviewable at all.

The only changes I would like to see are, the down by contact rule, which is absolute nonesense, and if a challenge is inconclusive you should not be charged a time out, inconclusive mean's that the challenger could very well be right, but because of camera angle you can't tell, I believe that should be a wash, I then want younger referee's on the field, and they also have to be in top shape, they should have to pass a physical test, as well as an eye test, I don't know why we have guy's who can't get out of their own way, and probably can't pass an eye exam for a drivier's license, on the field decieding the outcome of games? It's like the NFL has gone to WWF for ref's.

The down by contact rule is a joke but I can't think of a good way to change it. I guess the reason the rule works the way it does is so a player doesn't pick up a fumbled ball and score while everyone else sits with their thumbs up their butts since they heard the whistle. Problem is, if they tell refs to curtail the quick whistles then we'll start seeing guys getting piled on after their down and there doesn't seem to be a good way to augment to rules to make this more defense friendly. I guess maybe they should get rid of the crappy refs like my man says.

Good idea on the inconclusive replays but then the refs are left to decide when the replay is inconclusive and when the challenge was just plain wrong. Now we expect these dunces to get this right also? Man this starts the ball tumbling down the mountain.

No review of pass interference or expansion of reviewable plays. The games already take 3 hours, add in all those reviews and challenges and it'll climb to 4 hours.

The refs are there to enforce the rules, one or two missed calls a game is acceptable. Bad calls are part of the game, good teams overcome them and bad teams use them as excuses.

Inconclusive means that there is no visual evidence to support a challenge, seems pretty straightforward to me. You disagree with what the ref says happened on a play, you think you see something that they missed, well let the videotape prove it. But if you're wrong there has to be some penalty, because there definitely is a reward.

No review of pass interference or expansion of reviewable plays. The games already take 3 hours, add in all those reviews and challenges and it'll climb to 4 hours.
That is exactly the kind of argument the people that were against the original replay plan made. And it never happened. If it is implemented correctly, it won't add an hour to the games. It will just GREATLY improve the accuracy of calls, and decreade the number of times each year that a win is stolen from a team by incompetent refs. None of this would be necessary if the NFL would make the refs FULL TIME, and DEDICATED to this job. This is a side job for most, who have another primary job. If they spent their weeks working out with teams, they would be MUCH more competent. Every other major sport has dedicated refs.

That is exactly the kind of argument the people that were against the original replay plan made. And it never happened. If it is implemented correctly, it won't add an hour to the games. It will just GREATLY improve the accuracy of calls, and decreade the number of times each year that a win is stolen from a team by incompetent refs. None of this would be necessary if the NFL would make the refs FULL TIME, and DEDICATED to this job. This is a side job for most, who have another primary job. If they spent their weeks working out with teams, they would be MUCH more competent. Every other major sport has dedicated refs.

This is a good point. Does anyone know why the NFL lets their refs make this side job? I mean I know they only have one game a week unlike NBA and MLB but still doesn't that make it MORE important that the refs are of good quality since each game means so much?

The coaches are only allowed two challenges, plus a third if their first two are successful. I can't possibly see how allowing more plays to be reviewable would slow the game down at all. We're not talking about increasing the actual number of challenges are we?

Plus, there ARE review officials upstairs all the time. They're the ones who step in after the two minute warning. I like that rule. If the guys upstairs were changing calls throughout the whole game, it definitely WOULD slow things down a lot. Plus, since they're the only ones allowed to call for a review in the last two minutes, it obviously stops either team from gaining 'extra' time-outs.

I don't see anything wrong with allowing the coaches to challenge any type of call by the refs; be it a penalty, down by contact, fumble, premature whistle, ball placement, or whatever. It would be stupid to ask for a review when no penalty was called, but if a player is called for pass interference and the replay clearly shows that the opposing player initiated the contact, it only seems fair that the call should not only be reviewable, but the proper penalty should be implemented in it's place.

It does seem petty to challenge a 'holding' call, and I don't think any coaches really would. But, if it comes at a key moment, where the game outcome is on the line, and the guys in the booth can see it was a bogus call, why not make it challengeable?

The coaches have precious few challenges, so they're not going to throw them away unnecessarily. Also, has anyone noticed that there are still a lot of coaches who throw out the red flag on unreviewable calls? This, in effect, still gives them a brief time-out, and they aren't charged for it. By making more plays reviewable, it would erase these 'free' clock-stoppers.

I was going to say what Bunglehead said. It wouldn't slow the game down any more than it does now and coaches wouldn't waste one of their 2 (or 3) challenges to challenge a silly 5 yard penelty. Only fumbles, PI, etc.

I definately believe that pass-interference calls should be challengeable. They result is 50 yard gains/losses; they are game changers.

The coaches are only allowed two challenges, plus a third if their first two are successful. I can't possibly see how allowing more plays to be reviewable would slow the game down at all. We're not talking about increasing the actual number of challenges are we?

Plus, there ARE review officials upstairs all the time. They're the ones who step in after the two minute warning. I like that rule. If the guys upstairs were changing calls throughout the whole game, it definitely WOULD slow things down a lot. Plus, since they're the only ones allowed to call for a review in the last two minutes, it obviously stops either team from gaining 'extra' time-outs.

I don't see anything wrong with allowing the coaches to challenge any type of call by the refs; be it a penalty, down by contact, fumble, premature whistle, ball placement, or whatever. It would be stupid to ask for a review when no penalty was called, but if a player is called for pass interference and the replay clearly shows that the opposing player initiated the contact, it only seems fair that the call should not only be reviewable, but the proper penalty should be implemented in it's place.

It does seem petty to challenge a 'holding' call, and I don't think any coaches really would. But, if it comes at a key moment, where the game outcome is on the line, and the guys in the booth can see it was a bogus call, why not make it challengeable?

The coaches have precious few challenges, so they're not going to throw them away unnecessarily. Also, has anyone noticed that there are still a lot of coaches who throw out the red flag on unreviewable calls? This, in effect, still gives them a brief time-out, and they aren't charged for it. By making more plays reviewable, it would erase these 'free' clock-stoppers.


If you make more plays reviewable then why even have refs on the field? The reason some plays are reviewable and some aren't is because it's an imperfect game. The rules are subjective and open to interpretation, to review every potential game changing call means that you no longer need refs on the field to call the action. The refs have to make decisions and some of those decisions have to be binding, everything cannot be open for interpretation because if everything is then chaos results.

There are missed calls, its part of the game. It adds to the drama, but looking back on the game we still had a chance to win that game if we don't blow two timeouts early in the 2nd half. So the poor officiating, and it was definitely poor, didn't cost us the game. Poor clock management, wasted timeouts and dropped passes cost us the game. It's easy to use the officials as scapegoats, but it's part of the game and reviewing every play doesn't seem to make the game better to me.

I remember a playoff game between the 49ers and somebody. Jerry Rice caught a pass, was hit and fumbled but the refs blew the whistle and ruled him down by contact. Some things you just have to live with, blown calls being one of them.

The funny thing is if those two Pass Interference calls went in our favor instead of against us we'd never even be discussing expanding or changing replay.