Wednesday question

[Bob M.]

REPLY: With all due respect, I don't feel that any of the recent posters are feeling "...compelled to rule in contradiction to the rules." They are just ruling in a way that's inconsistent with your interpretation of the rules.

As I mentioned earlier, I can see validity in your logic, that since the pylon is OOB and a ball striking it may have crossed the sideline prior to striking it. And both codes have a rule that this--in normal circumstances--should be ruled OOB at the point where the ball crossed the sideline. However, the FED and the NCAA have both put in a rule that supersedes that logic when the pylon is involved in NF 4-3-2 and NCAA 4-2-3b. The issue these rules are designed to address is one of human frailty. In theory, a pylon has only one dimension, that being infinite height with no width or depth. Such a 'pylon' would be properly positioned at the intersection of the inside edge of the sideline and the field-facing edge of the goal line. This would exactly correspond with the intersection of the front face and inside face of the real pylon. I'm pretty certain that you would agree that any ball striking or passing through such a theoretical 'pylon' would be considered in the endzone as opposed to out of bounds. But no one--including us--could ever see such a 'pylon.' So we're 'forced' to give it some visible dimensions, namely 4" x 4" x 18". All the Federation and NCAA have decided to do is codify that this imperfect pylon is to be considered the same way you would consider the dimensionless pylon that can only exist in theory.

So, we're just going to have to agree to disagree (unless Mr. Diehl gets back to me with a definitive answer). Each of us will need to consider all we've read, all we've learned, all our mentors have told us and process it accordingly. We probably will rule this play differently. If a scrimmage kick rolls into the front face of the pylon, I'll be ruling a touchback; you'll be awarding the ball to R at their own half-inch line.

But as Roberto Duran once said, "No mas." Unless someone has something more definitive to offer, I suggest we just move on to other topics. I'm grateful that we've all been able to professionally disagree here with no malice and no juvenile bickering. We've seen plenty of that on some of these discussion boards.