Football Officiating > National Football League

The new catch rule is almost as bad as it was before

(1/1)

BrendanP:
Every time I got asked how the NFL could fix its catch rule, I always said “Just copy the NCAA definition.”
I think the 2018 rule change made more non-catches catches and it’s just as bad. The key is “control” being the new standard instead of possession. Take the Chargers/Chiefs last-second TD:



The receiver clearly does not secure the ball and establish possession of the ball until his foot is out of bounds, but under the current rule, this is now a catch because he has “control” of it but not possession. If this were NCAA or NFHS, there’s no way that stands as a catch. I think this is a rule that needs to be uniform across all levels of football.

Ralph Damren:

--- Quote from: BrendanP on February 04, 2019, 03:28:17 PM ---Every time I got asked how the NFL could fix its catch rule, I always said “Just copy the NCAA definition.”
I think the 2018 rule change made more non-catches catches and it’s just as bad. The key is “control” being the new standard instead of possession. Take the Chargers/Chiefs last-second TD:



The receiver clearly does not secure the ball and establish possession of the ball until his foot is out of bounds, but under the current rule, this is now a catch because he has “control” of it but not possession. If this were NCAA or NFHS, there’s no way that stands as a catch. I think this is a rule that needs to be uniform across all levels of football.
--- End quote ---

While I fully agree that "control" opens a different interp than "possession", I would strongly disagree adopting the NFL code that requires both feet to be IB for a completed catch. The challenge of determining if both feet have landed IB is much more difficult than that of first foot IB. Sometimes we have to be careful of what we wish for  :)!

Navigation

[0] Message Index