San Diego/Denver

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by lpneck

Basketball official here delurking...

I keep seeing the phrase "inadvertant whistle" thrown around. It wasn't an inadvertant whistle, right? He simply ruled it an incomplete pass, which would REQUIRE that he blows his whistle.

Am I missing something?

Yes it was ruled in inadvertent whistle. This is why they put the ball on the 10 yard line instead of the previous spot or original line of scrimmage.

Peace

[lpneck]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

Yes it was ruled in inadvertent whistle. This is why they put the ball on the 10 yard line instead of the previous spot or original line of scrimmage.

Peace

I think I get it... he ORIGINALLY thought he was ruling an incomplete pass, but then they reviewed it, and he realized it SHOULD have been a fumble, so that changed his whistle for the incomplete pass into an IW, and changed the spot.

Sorry, I'm like 4 days behind.

JRut- enjoyed working basketball last year, hope we get to do it again in the future... (We had a great game at a D2 school where we nailed a few calls at the end. I had the one with :01 left against the home team...)

[bisonlj]

Originally Posted by lpneck

I think I get it... he ORIGINALLY thought he was ruling an incomplete pass, but then they reviewed it, and he realized it SHOULD have been a fumble, so that changed his whistle for the incomplete pass into an IW, and changed the spot.

Correct. That's how I've looked at it as well. This wasn't your typical IW where an official created the situation by being too quick on his whistle. It only became an IW because of what happened in replay. A similar play in the HS game would be if the LJ came in to tell the R the ball actually went backwards and he got it wrong. In that case the result would also be an IW.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by lpneck

JRut- enjoyed working basketball last year, hope we get to do it again in the future... (We had a great game at a D2 school where we nailed a few calls at the end. I had the one with :01 left against the home team...)

An interesting day to say the least.

Peace

[dahoopref]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

Yes it was ruled in inadvertent whistle. This is why they put the ball on the 10 yard line instead of the previous spot or original line of scrimmage.

Peace

Not to split hairs here but.....

according to an NFL official friend who I talked to, the whistle should have nothing to do with the play.

Hochuli made the mistake of announcing to the crowd that "the play should have been ruled a fumble. By rule, the ball is dead when it hits the ground because the whistle was blown."

My friend told me, "The judgment of the play being an "incomplete pass" caused the ball to be dead, not the whistle. If the pass is ruled incomplete then the ball is dead when it hits the ground." On that play, the whistle has no bearing when the ball is dead.

NFL VP of Officiating, Mike Pereira, has told his Referees (white caps) at clinics to not use the word "whistle" when explaining a call to the crowd. Hochuli may have been flustered (as any of us might have) by his incorrect judgment and forgot what Pereria instructed not to say to the crowd.

[JRutledge]

I do not know who your friend is and honestly it is irrelevant. According to what Pereira said on several media outlets, it must have meant something. And if it did not mean anything, why put the ball back where the play was killed? Either you are misunderstanding your friend or Pereira is purposely deceiving the public. I will just ask one of the people that were on the game when I get a chance.

Peace

[pedr]

Surely 'Inadvertant Whistle' would be inaccurate as well. I'm no expert, but wouldn't ruling it an IW give the offence the opportunity to replay the down? Which would have been even worse for the Chargers.

How I see it, as a complete amateur, is that it was ruled a forward pass. That means the ball was dead once it hit the ground, and nothing past that point could matter. In fact, the ball was fumbled, so from the time when the ball left the QB's hand to the point where it hit the ground, it was a fumble. When it hit the ground, it was a fumbled ball that was then dead (technically due to the inital ruling, not due to the whistle, but the problem with revising the replay rules is, in fact, the whistle and players' reaction to it: see the Philadelphia-Dallas game). The team in possession of the ball immediately before it became dead was Denver, so they gain/retain possession of the ball at the point where it became dead, namely the 10 yard line, and the down counts. This is different from any kind of IW ruling, I would have thought.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by pedr

Surely 'Inadvertant Whistle' would be inaccurate as well. I'm no expert, but wouldn't ruling it an IW give the offence the opportunity to replay the down? Which would have been even worse for the Chargers.

How I see it, as a complete amateur, is that it was ruled a forward pass. That means the ball was dead once it hit the ground, and nothing past that point could matter. In fact, the ball was fumbled, so from the time when the ball left the QB's hand to the point where it hit the ground, it was a fumble. When it hit the ground, it was a fumbled ball that was then dead (technically due to the inital ruling, not due to the whistle, but the problem with revising the replay rules is, in fact, the whistle and players' reaction to it: see the Philadelphia-Dallas game). The team in possession of the ball immediately before it became dead was Denver, so they gain/retain possession of the ball at the point where it became dead, namely the 10 yard line, and the down counts. This is different from any kind of IW ruling, I would have thought.

The NFL is a different code. You cannot compare NFL rules to other levels.

Peace

[pedr]

As I said, complete amateur. I'm not even American - just interested.

What is the NFL rule on IW, then?

In any event, it strikes me as a factually incorrect term to use for what happened (and Mike Pereira didn't use it on Official Review, as far as I remember). The whistle was not inadvertant - the whistle followed and reflected the Referee's decision. The implications of that decision were a dead ball, last possessed by Denver, which logically leads to Denver retaining possession.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by pedr

As I said, complete amateur. I'm not even American - just interested.

What is the NFL rule on IW, then?

I do not know, but I know that with well over 200 differences from the NCAA level to the NFL Level (and about the same number when you compare NF and NCAA). I am going to assume that the application with replay has a different twist to that rule or where the ball it put after the IW.

Originally Posted by pedr

In any event, it strikes me as a factually incorrect term to use for what happened (and Mike Pereira didn't use it on Official Review, as far as I remember). The whistle was not inadvertant - the whistle followed and reflected the Referee's decision. The implications of that decision were a dead ball, last possessed by Denver, which logically leads to Denver retaining possession.

If you kill a play when it was not supposed to be killed, that is an inadvertant whistle. That would be no different when you call a player down when they clearly do not have the ball. This was the same thing. The only difference was the NFL has replay and that is how they noticed the situation.

Peace