Great Proposed Rule Change

This sounds like a great idea:

Being an NFL division winner may no longer guarantee a home playoff game... The two division winners with the best records in each conference would still enjoy a first-round bye, but seeds No. 3 through No. 6 would be slotted by record, although division winners would have a tiebreaker edge over wild-card qualifiers.

Should the proposal receive the 24 owner votes needed to pass, the regular season's final week could get much more interesting than it was in 2007...

"We do support the idea that a (system) re-working can (make) more games count late in the year," Atlanta Falcons President and Competition Committee co-chairman Rich McKay said Wednesday on an NFL conference call. "We think that's a better solution than trying to get into the business of legislating who a coach should play."

On the one hand, I like the traditional set-up of rewarding division winners.  On the other, there's nothing worse than those sham week 17 contests where two teams have a vested interest in the results and the others just want to stay healthy.

Not all the proposed rule changes make much sense, however:

Revamping the "force-out" definition for a wide receiver not getting both feet inbounds when making a sideline catch.

"The rule says a receiver can't be carried or pushed out of bounds by an opponent," McKay said. "We would delete 'pushed'...There are so many levels of judgment that go into a force-out call. This would be much more consistent. Either you get your feet down or not."

First of all, don't change the rule.  If you allow defensive backs to push people out of bounds, you're going to end up with a lot of defensive backs who are good at pushing people out of bounds.  I think all the rules to encourage offense have gone a little overboard, but this is one case where you'd just be making the game less fun by making it harder to score in the red zone.

More importantly, what's the dividing line between "pushing" someone and "carrying" them.  Is it only a "carry" if the receiver attempts to make a football move while being contacted by the defender?  You're just replacing one judgment call with another.

The only real problem I see with the force out rule comes with the replay review.  I don't think there's a provision for making a two-stage call on a play -- i.e., a referee rules that a player was in bounds when making the catch but even if he hadn't been then it was because he was forced out.  Maybe the refs handle this unofficially with coaches, but I think that this "backup call" thing should be codified.

Comments

[Tracer Bullet]

I disagree. All the force-out rule does is punish defenders for no good reason. If college kids can figure out how to get a foot on the the ground, surely pros can do the same.

[Me]

Sure, which is a stylistic choice with no "right" answer. But dumping the "pushout" rule because it's a judgment call and then keeping the "carryout" rule even though it's also a judgment call just seems kind of bizarre.

We've seen plays before where a receiver goes up to make a catch and the defender wraps up his legs and takes him out of bounds. Is that a push or a carry?

[whoismariowilliams]

I've always liked the NCAA rule much better. No judgement at all; he either got one foot in or he didn't.

[Tracer Bullet]

What Mario said. Get two feet on the ground or it's not a catch. End of story.