NFL Catch Rule vs. NCAA & NFHS

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by ajmc

NFL rules are designed for extraordinary talented and experienced professional athletes, who are grown men in a profit centered environment, with unique objectives, whereas NFHS rules cover Interscholastic and "sandlot" athletic development level programs. Each rule code is designed for it's specific participants.

But that has nothing to do with this distinction. It may, however, have to do with the relative skills of their respective officials.

[ajmc]

Originally Posted by Robert Goodman

But that has nothing to do with this distinction. It may, however, have to do with the relative skills of their respective officials.

You CANNOT dig yourself out of a hole, by digging downward. The existing rules determining "a catch" weren't absolutely perfect, but served really well for a long time.

Has this adjustment clarified anything, improved, or clarified, everyone's understanding and acceptance of what's necessary? If you scratch the smallest, most benign blemish, long enough or hard enough intending to remove it, you can make it bleed of infected.

Sometimes the most sensible way to eliminate a hole, is simply to put all the dirt back in, and accept it's a potential, but rarely problematic, hole.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by ajmc

You CANNOT dig yourself out of a hole, by digging downward. The existing rules determining "a catch" weren't absolutely perfect, but served really well for a long time.

Has this adjustment clarified anything, improved, or clarified, everyone's understanding and acceptance of what's necessary? If you scratch the smallest, most benign blemish, long enough or hard enough intending to remove it, you can make it bleed or infected.

Sometimes the most sensible way to eliminate a hole, is simply to put all the dirt back in, and accept it's a potential, but rarely problematic, hole.

I agree with all this...I think. There's no way to get away from the factual judgment of whether a player has a good enough grip on the ball (and the requisite body parts on the ground in bounds). You can put in various extra criteria in certain cases in an attempt to get rid of that judgment, but all you'll succeed in doing is transferring part or all of the judgment of one factual cirumstance to another, and complicating the whole procedure.

Some players falling while catching or recovering a ball hit the ground and lost it or caused it to touch the ground. In some cases the officials ruled that possession preceded the ball's popping out or the player's hitting the ground, and in other cases that there had been no possession, and they may have been correct or incorrect in either case. Other people looking at the same play frequently would disagree with their judgment, as is part and parcel of such determinations. But it looked like seeing whether the ball subsequently hit the ground or came loose might've been a good proxy in some cases for whether the player's grasp was good enough (so good that some people in this thread would use it as a way to rule in cases in Fed or NCAA), and in some cases easier to see, so the NFL adopted a provision holding the judgment of possession in abeyance until that determination could be made. But that turns out not to be an easier thing to see in many cases. The judgment has merely been shifted to a question of whether the player was "going to the ground" during the catch, or a catch occurred before the player started "going to the ground". Not to mention cases wherein under the new rule a player rolls over on the ball as part of a motion to the ground with the ball in hands, and you'd theoretically have to see whether the ball touched the ground while you're screened from seeing it by that player's body.

BTW, the previous wording as part of possession, "[enough] to perform any act common to the game", I had to laugh at. NCAA got rid of that language long ago because they realized it didn't make any judgment easier, while NFL kept it.

[FormerUmp]

Nobody has anything to say about the suggestion in that video?

I really don't think it's any more subjective than the rule as it currently exists.

[JRutledge]

There is nothing to say because I do not care what uneducated people have to say honestly.

This is actually someone in the know talking about this issue. Some guy creating a video is nice, but not relevant.



Peace

[FormerUmp]

It seems strange that you would ask for an alternative and then decline comment when one is presented.

The video also does a good job of making my point on the failures of replay on these calls.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by FormerUmp

It seems strange that you would ask for an alternative and then decline comment when one is presented.

The video also does a good job of making my point on the failures of replay on these calls.

I was not asking for an alternative, you were not giving one while complaining. This is your beef. I like the rule and so does the NFL. I see why the rule is the way it is and like the current rule. Your position would cause other issues which are against the very thing Bill Polian addressed.

Here is also the thing, people clamor for replay until it is actually executed. This is the beat that fans wanted, now you complain when they do exactly what you wished for. Ironic isn't it?

Peace

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

There is nothing to say because I do not care what uneducated people have to say honestly.

Uneducated? He speaks from experience as a player. When you feel the football in your hands, you know what possession is. Then it's just a matter of the rules makers translating that to something an official can see.

This is actually someone in the know talking about this issue. Some guy creating a video is nice, but not relevant.



Peace

They didn't shrink the grey area, they just moved it. Now the grey area is over determining when a player is going to the ground while attempting a catch or recovery.

Besides, this didn't get rid of the most controversial catch-&-fumble or recovery-&-fumble calls, because most of them didn't involve the ball's coming out because of contact with the ground.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by Robert Goodman

Uneducated? He speaks from experience as a player. When you feel the football in your hands, you know what possession is. Then it's just a matter of the rules makers translating that to something an official can see.

Players sit on the competition committee of the NFL and write the rules?

Originally Posted by Robert Goodman

They didn't shrink the grey area, they just moved it. Now the grey area is over determining when a player is going to the ground while attempting a catch or recovery.

Well, it is better than ruling a TD by the Cowboys in the Super Bowl. I saw that play years before I was an official and thought there is no way that was a catch, but it was ruled one. I am fine with the way the rule is.

Originally Posted by Robert Goodman

Besides, this didn't get rid of the most controversial catch-&-fumble or recovery-&-fumble calls, because most of them didn't involve the ball's coming out because of contact with the ground.

You will never get rid of controversy. But if you change it to what some people think you will have nothing but controversy. Because if you change the rule to what some want, you will have several bad turnovers, which seems to be the reason for the change over the years.

Peace

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by FormerUmp

Nobody has anything to say about the suggestion in that video?

I like it, except for the concept of distinguishing action out of bounds from that in bounds. Somebody makes a late hit out of bounds, we don't want that to be discounted because it was out of bounds; etc. A determination of dead ball spot or touchdown can be held in abeyance pending evidence of a catch, so I don't see the problem he does with that part. But he's right on when it comes to his initial critique and fix.

[bisonlj]

To satisfy all the pundits and fans who think the current rule isn't consistent, I offer this suggestion.

If my gut tells me it's a catch, it's a catch.

You can't get much simpler than that. It's also grossly subjective, but this is the only way I think we can satisfy all these "experts." The stupid fan video actually shows how consistent the calls have been. In the Gronk case he appears to control the ball the entire time and the fact it may have scraped the ground is irrelevant. The other Patriots catch it's hard to tell if the ball came loose. If it did, that would be incomplete. As I recall, the Steelers INT was graded as an incorrect application of the catch rule. That's still subjective but sometimes supervisors/graders will get the call wrong.

[FormerUmp]

Originally Posted by bisonlj

To satisfy all the pundits and fans who think the current rule isn't consistent, I offer this suggestion.

If my gut tells me it's a catch, it's a catch.

You can't get much simpler than that. It's also grossly subjective, but this is the only way I think we can satisfy all these "experts." The stupid fan video actually shows how consistent the calls have been. In the Gronk case he appears to control the ball the entire time and the fact it may have scraped the ground is irrelevant. The other Patriots catch it's hard to tell if the ball came loose. If it did, that would be incomplete. As I recall, the Steelers INT was graded as an incorrect application of the catch rule. That's still subjective but sometimes supervisors/graders will get the call wrong.

In the Gronkowski play, the ball rotates significantly upon contact with the ground. The ball clearly moves in the Falcons play as well. There's just no consistency.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by bisonlj

To satisfy all the pundits and fans who think the current rule isn't consistent, I offer this suggestion.

If my gut tells me it's a catch, it's a catch.

AFAIK, that's how it's been ruled in baseball since, like, forever. Baseball has lots of cases of fielders falling with the ball, the ball's popping out, the ball's being carried over a field boundary, and cases where voluntary release has to be distinguished from failure to catch. Yet even at the highest levels of the game, unlike the NFL, they've never seen a need to refine it further or adopt some proxy determination for that judgment call.