(Question From a Fan) IW & Replay

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by APG

I take it you haven't seen a college or pro game in recent past?

Not too recently, no. I found after a few years of coaching that I could no longer enjoy just watching whole games, though I could continue to enjoy watching clips to learn from, games in our organiz'n or division, or a little bit if the TV was on where I was with friends.

In games with replay, one reviewable play is down versus fumble. If a player is ruled to be down prior to a fumble, yet actually fumbled prior to being down, possession can be awarded to the opponent if replay shows a clear recovery during the immediate action after the play.

In the NFL (and the same may be true under NCAA rules), the same is true for a play ruled to be a forward pass yet replay shows it to be a backward pass and the same is true for a pass ruled to be incomplete on the field, yet replay shows a catch and fumble or in the case of the passer, the ball is knocked out prior to the arm going forward, making it a fumble.

In all of the situations above, if the opponent recovers the ball, they get possession but do not get any yards after recovery.

So they should no longer play to the whistle (or until other evidence the ball is dead, whichever is sooner), but play until...uh...some time after "immediate action" is over? And officials didn't say to the rules committee that that would be a really, really bad idea?

You know, a lot of things in sports are matters of taste. Actually, practically everything in sports is. You know, like whether to allow the spitball, the forward pass, 1 or 2 seconds for a pin, all that stuff. But whether to have a clear signal in a contact sport for the players to stop?! There are sports like basketball where some play after a whistle is allowed to count, but the situations are limited enough that the participants are still able to draw a clear line on what to do. This does not appear to be one of those cases.

Has this had the side effect of officials whistling quicker to compensate, so that there are more IW? Because the disincentive for an IW is not as great?