Halftime thought experiment
Imagine, for the sake of argument, that a tackle is made at the goal line on a third-down play—say, in the Super Bowl, for example. The officials on the field have to make a call. It's either a touchdown, or fourth and goal. What if they don't know what to call? It doesn't matter, they have to pick one.
Then, they go to the replay booth and look it over for a couple minutes. Even if they're ninety percent sure—even if they're ninety-nine percent sure—that the call on the field—that arbitrary call that they had to make just to have something—is the wrong one, it can't be overruled, by rule.
That is a rule that needs to change. As Evan has said before, make the best call you can based on the video evidence. The call on the field was made in real time. The replay can be observed in slow motion. The call on the field was based on one perspective (usually), the replay can check several angles. It's time football had the best call, not either a one hundred percent call or a fifty-fifty one.
posted by Roy @ 7:52 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
The Big Ben TD reminded me of the OU-Texas Tech football game that cost OU a Cotton Bowl appearance. There are a couple things that were wrong in each instance. I'll start from the beginning. The official who is marking the play, in both instances, ran in like he had it marked short of the goal line initially. Then, after further inspection, called it a touchdown. This is ridiculous! The ball is to be marked where the ball is when the player is down. The official should only judge the spot from what he sees during the play, not what he sees after the runner has crept forward, reached the ball across the goal line, or otherwise adjusted position, on purpose of not. It doesn't matter where the ball is when the official gets to the middle of the field. Both times, the official had it right initially, only to change the spot and rule the play a TD. Oops.
Then, they did they right thing and reviewed the play. I was optimistic the OU-Texas Tech play would be reversed, although I think my hope was misplaced. In the Super Bowl, I was almost certain it wouldn't be reversed, even though I saw no evidence that the ball reached the goal line. It wasn't just me. My wife and our neighbors (we went next door to watch the game) all believed Roethlisberger was just a bit short.
If they aren't going to get the play right, don't review it. Replay is used to get plays right, I thought. Perhaps, replay is just a way to appease fans. "Oh, we're trying to get it right, we have replay." That's like a bank saying, "We value customer service, we have an automated system to handle all your issues." Thanks, but don't try to sell me that crap. I'm an a huge proponent of replay beause I think they should get calls (especially important ones) right. However, I'm not really a proponent of the current replay system because it is abused under the guise of not having "indisputable video evidence". Right now, it's just a waste of two minutes most of the time.
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