Replay has a place in league
Posted: Thursday December 10, 1998 11:12 AM
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Sometime next week the NFL's Competition Committee will meet to discuss
adopting instant replay for the playoffs. My first reaction? This has
panic written all over it, changing the rules while the season is
still in progress. My second reaction? At least the league is doing
something to address the problem. To be honest, I don't know which of my
reactions is the true one. I won't know until I see the replay. Ha ha.
O.K., I'll be serious, since we're dealing with real earth-shaking stuff
here.
The league has two problems -- No. 1, big officiating blunders just as the
season is heating up, and No. 2, image. It's in the image business, don't
forget. All this is very bad for the public perception of the game, to say
nothing of the way it's been handled on the field.
But to throw in a quick fix at this time, when it takes the Competition
Committee the entire offseason to come up with a decent proposal? Hmmm, I'm
not so sure. If you believe in replay, as I do, you've got to be afraid
that a hastily arrived solution might not work right, thereby poisoning the
well for the vote next spring. So what do you do, just sit tight and hope
that the officials don't blow any more big ones? And keep reading and
hearing all that stuff in the papers and on TV, all that hand-wringing
about what a disgrace this is, and how gutless the NFL is, etc.? Or do you
jump in and tell the committee -- "Give us something. Anything."
Here's another problem. There are three coaches on the committee: the
Packers' Mike Holmgren , the Vikings' Dennis Green and the
Steelers' Bill Cowher . All three are in the playoff hunt. Coaches'
time is normally very precious during the season. I mean, a minute after
they've begun talking to you, they're looking at their watches. How do you
steal a chunk of their time at this crucial period to get them debating
about replay?
"It can be done," says Colts GM Bill Polian , who's on
the committee. "They're all well-versed on the issue. We've been
talking back and forth all season. We could set up a phone conference for
next Tuesday, which is an off-day during the week."
All right, assuming that it can be handled next week, and even assuming
that a system can be quickly implemented, and it's so successful that it'll
be voted in at the general meeting in the spring, what kind of a system
will it be? Will they go for the no-penalty, unlimited replay system that
was in effect in the late 1980s, or will it be the challenge system, which
could cost a team a timeout and which failed to pass last time?
I gave you some wrong information last week. I said that commissioner
Paul Tagliabue was the guy who effectively killed the idea of replay
by attaching penalties to it. Since then I've talked to some coaches and
committee members and from what I can gather, Tagliabue gave explicit
instructions to frame the proposal in such a way as to eliminate the
endless delays, but the idea of challenges actually came from the coaches.
I still find this hard to believe, that the coaches would penalize
themselves. Tuesday I expressed my skepticism to Rich McKay , Tampa
Bay's GM, who co-chairs the Competition Committee along with Holmgren.
"It came out of coaching surveys run by Tony Dungy and
Marty Schottenheimer ," McKay said. "It seemed to be what the
coaches wanted. The feeling was that the best way to get instant replay
passed was to go to a challenge system and eliminate the endless
interruptions that the owners hate, and after all, it's mainly the owners
who do the voting.
"Two years ago, it failed. The coaches, on thinking it over, didn't
like to lose timeouts. So last year it came back in less onerous form. It
failed again. Some coaches, such as Cowher and Holmgren and Green, who were
in favor of the challenges at first, changed their minds. People became
fearful, so we said, 'Let's go back and try again.'"
Bill Parcells voted for replay with challenges. Then last week,
after Phil Luckett's crew handed him the Seattle game, he said he
didn't like it. "So why did you vote for it?" he was asked.
"Because I was out of my mind," he said.
Which only means that coaches are changeable. The problem with clean
replays, minus penalty or challenge, is that there are some nudniks who'll
call for a replay on anything, thereby slowing the game down interminably.
The problem with, say, two—and only two—challenges is that you
might use them up on what you think is important and lose out on some
biggies later that really should have gone to replay. And during the
course of a game, who can tell what is really significant?
Let's look at the Jets-Seahawks game, for instance. It was decided, of
course, by a non-TD being ruled a score at the end, but in the fourth
quarter there were a couple of other decisions that, at the time, seemed
crucial. Granted, interference or judgment calls don't come under the
replay aegis, but who knows? Some day people might figure out a way to
review them.
Down 31-26 with a little over seven minutes to go, the Jets have the ball,
second-and-10 on their own 36. A 25-yard interference penalty is called on
cornerback Shawn
Springs covering Keyshawn Johnson. A
terrible call. Four plays later the Jets have a second-and-13 on the
Seattle 24. Vinny
Testaverde backs up, stays in the pocket, feels the rush and throws a
one-hopper to no one, as clear a case of grounding as you'll ever see. No
penalty. Huh? Luckett's battle station is directly behind the line. He
should have been in perfect position to make the call, but his handkerchief
stayed in his pocket. Intentional grounding is not subject to replay, but
why not include it, since a second view could prove conclusive?
Both plays seemed crucial, but it turned out that they weren't, since the
Jets were stopped on that drive. But how would you be able to tell at the
time?
It's always been unclear as to which subjects come under review. Sideline
and end zone, including the goal line. Period. Why not fumbles? Or
interceptions? Did the ball hit the ground or didn't it?
"Not possible," McKay says, "because the refs will say that
the whistle blew, ending the play. And that's that. You remember all those
inadvertent whistles? A nightmare."
O.K., so what lies ahead? "I've always been a replay
protagonist," Polian says, "but right now I'm open minded. I have
no preferences at this point. I'll go into that meeting next week, if we
have one, and listen to what everyone has to say, and add what I can."
"I've been against replay," McKay says, "and I still don't
like the concept. But I'm not going to be the one to block it. I think we
really have to differentiate between the five-yard sideline pass and the
play that could change a game. How we'll do that will be the subject of
next week's meeting, and we have to hold it. I think that if we come up
with something sensible, it'll pass next spring."
Here's my idea. Take the idea of challenges out of the hands of the coach
entirely. Have a set of replay officials make the call -- young, vibrant
guys, officials on the rise, not that gang of old-timers who had the
responsibility the first time, mostly supervisor of officials Art McNally's
old cronies, who couldn't pull the trigger. Call it right away, and have
the on-field officials also study the monitor, so they won't be standing
around looking stupid (and undignified) as they once did.
Unlimited replays will be permitted, but have guys with brains and guts
deciding what's significant enough to challenge, and what's insignificant.
As far as Luckett, who right now is the villain of the piece? Well, next
year I think you'll still find him listed on the roster of officials, but
not as a referee. Very quietly, without any fanfare, Dale Hamer
and Gary Lane , each a referee at one time, were demoted to head
linesman and side judge, respectively. I'm sure Luckett would make a swell
back judge, or maybe field judge. Maybe they could get him a job on
someone's groundskeeping crew.
"How about this?" said a guy I know in the league office, and
lest this opens the floodgates of mail, he was kidding. "In a great
show of power, we assign Phil Luckett the Super Bowl?"
Oh, man, would I ever applaud that! The sheer audacity of it, striking back
and giving the world the high-yup-and-over, the Italian salute. I have an
old Edward R. Murrow record called I Can Hear It Now, and
my favorite part is the sound of the jungle warfare in the Pacific, in
which the big guns are fired, followed by a roar of the jungle animals. The
segment is called "The Jungle Answers Back."
That's what it would be for the NFL, in its final glory, as fans storm the
offices: The Jungle Answers Back.
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