College clock rules
 

I am wondering what college football officials think about the 2006 college rules that mandated clock starts on when the ball is kicked on a kickoff, and starting the game clock after change of possession when the ball was ready for play.

As a fan I thought the rule changes were consistent with what football is all about and did speed up the games.

It appears coaches will force a return to the old rules, for obvious reasons.


My overall concern is that the games will not be permitted to go past four hours and some changes to affect that will be made. If not the 2006 rules, then what?

As a broadcaster, I don't like the 30 seconds for called timeouts. The radio broadcasts I produce are for a team that will probably be on TV only twice. So we will be scrambling to get the commercials in. We have to make it fair for the network sponsors and the local affiliates and the NCAA has made that harder.

I like going back to the old kickoff rule, though.

My own preference would simplify the timing rules enormously, but they'd also eliminate the clock tactics that've grown up in the game to be either loved or hated over the years.

With few exceptions, I'd have the clock run whenever the ball was in play or ready for play (starting even with the opening whistle), and be stopped otherwise. One exception would be the try, which would remain untimed -- although my preference would be to eliminate the try entirely. Another exception would be that any repeated down (or automatic first down) would be untimed, including its RFP interval. The third exception would be that time would not count during, and until the ball was put in play following, a team time-out. The fourth, rare, exception would be that time would count during administration of a penalty (and the remainder of the dead ball interval) for delay of game or USC in cases where the foul was an effort to conserve time.

A disadvantage of my rules would be their requiring more starts & stops of the clock than any other rules in use, increasing the chances of error. An advantage of my rules is that they'd eliminate consumption or conservation of time by fouling. The further elimination of clock tactics -- making the clock stop & start the same regardless of how it became dead, mostly -- can be viewed as either an advantage or disadvantage, depending on your view of the game.

Robert

Is this any different than the rules that are already in place that deal with unfair clock tactics?

The first part, "consumption or conservation of time by fouling", only a subtle difference. Under current rules you get an extension of the period for accepted penalties when time has expired, but you don't get the time back if, say, a team fouls on the next to last play of a half or game. My idea is that if you're repeating a down, you should also "repeat the time".

The second part depends on what's considered "unfair". Where the word appears in the rule book, i.e. its official meaning, it refers only to actions that are already specifically illegal but under-penalized by the specified penalty, or to actions unanticipated by the written rules but which would be obviously against the spirit of the game or of fair play -- like, say, switching the lights off to keep the visiting team from completing a pass.

But people can have a more general idea of fair & unfair that's just a matter of individual taste, or what they think should or shouldn't be part of the game. I think it's silly the way North American football has evolved clock tactics that cause teams to favor one type of play or another based on the timing rules. Sure, they add an extra dimension to the game that can be interesting; it's just that I think they detract from the game overall. It's no different from arguing over the designated hitter in baseball, which provides added interest of its own but affects the tactics and whose overall effect on the game can be taken as positive or negative. Anyway, my rules would make it just about immaterial whether a team that's ahead or behind chooses to run or pass, or to keep the ball in bounds or go out of bounds with it, which the current rules make a very consequential decision. As a side effect, they'd reduce variation in the length of games.

Robert

I believe that Jason's comment was related to NCAA Rule 3.4.3 which gives the R significant control over the clock whenever either team fouls in a manner that would give them a "clock advantage" when we're at that point in a game when the game clock is critical.

I would agree that depending on how the R invokes 3.4.3 he has all of the "tools" he needs to prevent either team from unfairly "using the clock" by fouling.

While not truly knowledgeable of NCAA rules, I have to say starting the clock on the ready for play with NFHS produced much longer games and led to less fair catches -- fair catch caused the clockto start on the snap versus the ready for play.

Not quite all. It doesn't provide for an untimed down. The ref is allowed to keep the clock stopped until the ball is put in play, but no longer.

With 8 secs. left in the game, team A, trailing by 5 points, snaps from wherever, and B1 is blatantly offside and blindsides A's quarterback. There are then 4 secs. remaining. The penalty for offside is enforced, and A snaps with 4 secs. left, but they don't get back the 4 secs. that ran off during their previous, futile play. If there were 0 time left, they'd get an untimed down, but because the down on which the foul occurred didn't use up the remainder of the period, they don't get an untimed down.

Robert

Since the main concern ist the length of televised games, a simple thing would be to go to the NFL rule for Division I and not stop the clock for team A 1st downs.
Reasoning:
1. There is already a difference between divisions in regard of instant replay.
2. At Div I level, chain crews should be competent enough to not cause delays.
3. Games without TV are not affected at all.
4. The lesser number of plays corresponds with the fact that Div I games are played at a level almost as demanding on the players' body as that of the NFL
5. Getting playing time for backups is not that much a concern for the big colleges.