Two questions

[SportsFan]

Originally Posted by SethPDX

Has the topic of "second act" come up before on an Official Review segment? In every sport there are tons of approved rulings and interpretations the general public doesn't know about until the situation happens in a game. I think Pereira and the NFL do just fine in trying to explain the rules to non-officials.

There was a rash of controversial catch rulings at the beginning of this season. Pereira did refer to a "second act" in this Week 2 bonus:
NFL Videos: Official Review Week 2 bonus coverage

In the Jacoby Jones play, he says that after he goes to the ground the "second act" of hitting the ground again completes the catch. The Dante Rosario play is where I have a real problem with his explanation. This was almost exactly like the play in the Super Bowl, except, as Pereira makes sure to mention, the ruling was Rosario was not going to the ground. I logically assumed that Pereira brought this up because if Rosario had been going to the ground, it would have been incompletion. I had always believed the "second act" referred to something occuring after hitting the ground which signified the end of the process.

Aside from all of that, the ruling on the incompletion at 0:40 in this video seems to go against what Pereira said Sunday night.

NFL Videos: NFL GameDay: Ravens-Steelers highlights

Holmes reaching for the endzone looks pretty clearly like a second act to me.

[mbyron]

I sure hope this "second act" business stalls on its way down. That's a ruling designed for replay.

[BigFarns]

I've only been an official for a few years and wouldn't dream of questioning NFL officials. But this call and the subsequent discussions I've had with other officials in my area have definately called into question what I thought I knew about a catch.

I've had a couple philosophies that have guided my called when dealing with catches in the end zone.

1) the player must maintain possession through the whole catch.

2) if it's not a catch at the 50 yard line then it's not a catch in the end zone.

What I saw on this play was possession, then during the 'second act' extending for the goalline a bobble, then possession again that could not be maintained because the ball was knocked away by the leg of the Colt player. I'm hard pressed to say that a few frames worth of possession is a catch otherwise there are literally thousands of catch, turn to run, hit, ball comes out type situations that would now be catches.


My questions are as follows.

-Did I miss something about the slow motion review of the play?
-Are the two philosophies I mentioned flawed in some way?