Lions @ Bears

[King_B_Mack]

Quote: Originally Posted by muggins

Nope, he definitely stumbled. It sounded like some dude they picked up in the back of the trailer who was holding a boom mic or something.

You realize that he KNOWS the rulebook right? He's on tv every week as he appears on the NFL Network to go over the week's officiating. He knows what he's talking about.

[Jistic]

I'm getting dumber the more I read this thread.

[roadman]

Quote: Originally Posted by Jistic

I'm getting dumber the more I read this thread.

You are not the lone ranger.

[Keirik]

Quote: Originally Posted by roadman

You are not the lone ranger.

thirded lol

[KBLover]

Quote: Originally Posted by muggins

Yup. I listened to the dude on Fox. He sounded like a bumbling moron. Possession was maintained throughout the act of the catch; he was down once his *** hit the ground. The rule is being mis-used in this situation, which doesn't surprise me since it is an NFL crew and they've been terrible the last few years.

No, the rule was not misused. The rule doesn't indicate butts hitting the ground, but controlling the ball all the way through contact to the ground, which, if he's still moving, is still occurring. The contact with the ground aspect stopped when the ball hit the ground. If he had held on to the ball then, it probably would have been overturned on replay if not called a TD on the field.

It USED to be 2 feet or one other body part other than your hand. (A knee = 2 feet as Madden used to say) Under the rules of the 80's and 90's, this was a clear cut TD. Possession, 2 feet, knee, butt, elbow - he got like 8 feet down.

But under the current "let's find ways to complicate the game" rules, it was correctly called incomplete. Ruling correct, rule sucks. The rule requires possession through going to the ground - the whole way, not just initially on the ground. If he had maintained his balance, we don't have this discussion. Instead, we'd be talking about how awesome Megatron is and how clutch that play and throw was.

As far as the guy on FOX - he sounded like he was trying to justify how that crap rule works and couldn't, so he just recited the rule and put the play in that perspective, which is what officials do. They don't justify rules. They just mediate the game in accordance to them to the best of their human ability. Billick was asking for justification or "why is it like that?" (which is not unexpected given his coaching mindset to the game - just like Gruden hated that "running into the kicker" that got called on Braylon. Another "ruling correct, rule sucks" situation) which, honestly, is a good question to the WRONG person (he should ask the folks on the Competition Committee). Other questions were basically in the same vein? "Why isn't it good enough that his 2 feet were down with possession?" "Why isn't it a TD when he never lost control with contact on the defender and then initial contact with the ground?" Again, great questions - wrong target.

He was looking for answers he didn't have and isn't trained to have. When that happens to computers, they crash, BSOD, and reboot. When he happens to people, they stumble. The brain is locked up trying to find an answer so there's not enough CPU cycles to engage speech functions. The receiving human perceives that as stumbling. Really, he didn't have the answers and didn't know what else to tell them.