Zebra Blog

For his involvement in a sideline fight during the game with the Texans, Titans defensive tackle Jason Jones received a $5,000 fine. (He was also ejected from the game.) This is surprisingly light, as the disqualified Jones was shown pumping up the crowd for support on his way to the locker room. This is tantamount to criticizing the referee’s call, as he is looking to be applauded for his unsportsmanlike behavior. That alone merits higher discipline, considering Santonio Holmes’ Super Bowl XLIII touchdown celebration was fined $10,000 for another unsportsmanlike gesture.

The lower fine might be a result of the video of the game not clearly showing a punch being thrown. However, Jones clearly thrust himself into the situation and escalated it. The league’s Schedule of Fines lists “Unnecessarily Entering Fight Area (active involvement)” as a minimum of $5,000 on first offense, less than the $10,000 for fighting which would be assessed for a punch.

Update 9/25/09: The league is reporting two Texans were also fined. Jacoby Jones was fined $5,000 for entering a fight area as well. Andre Johnson, who was also flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct after the play, was fined $7,500 for pulling a player to the ground by the facemask. Neither was ejected from the game.

Without getting into tremendous detail, the Week 2 edition of “Official Review” (two-part video that aired on NFL Net and NFL.com) covered the same topics we covered this week. The assessments we gave on the calls were entirely backed up by the league’s vice president of officiating, Mike Pereira. The calls under Official Review:

• The call of interference with a fair catch on the Titans
• The interception caught off of a foot by the Giants, overturned on replay, but the return nullified.
• The catch possession through to the ground was discussed as it pertained to the Texans and Panthers touchdowns being upheld. Also, the Dolphins had an interception overturned on Monday Night Football on similar grounds (video highlight at 1:05).

The segment also covered the noncontroversial call on the last play of the Bengals–Packers game. With the clock about to expire, referee Ed Hochuli ruled that the game was over prior to the snap. He then corrected the call that there was one second left on the clock, but since the Packers were not set in their stance at the snap, it was a false-start penalty. Of course, a false start with the clock running under two minutes also includes a 10-second runoff, which then consumed the one second. It was only a matter of clean bookkeeping, as the game ended without a play being run under both circumstances.

Pereira did express regret that the catch/ground issue has been so misconstrued and misunderstood only two weeks into the season. Whether this results in a Competition Committee review (as he alluded to with the Titans interference play) remains to be seen.

Pro Football Talk is reporting that the league office is backing up two borderline touchdown calls from the weekend: Dante Rosario’s catch for the Panthers and Jacoby Jones’s reception for the Titans.

According to league spokesman, Greg Aiello:

On Rosario, he completed the catch, turned up field and stretched the ball over the goal line for a touchdown before he goes to the ground. He didn’t use the ground to complete the catch.  In the Oakland play, Murphy goes straight to the ground.

On Jacoby Jones, he caught the ball, his knee hit the ground, and he maintained possession. Then the Titans player flipped him over the top and [Jones] hit the ground a second time and lost the ball.  But it was already a touchdown by virtue of maintaining possession the first time he hit the ground.

The assessment from the league fairly consistent with our previous discussions on the topic, albeit still controversial.

Week 2: Panthers at Falcons

I was convinced that the allusions to the Raiders touchdown reversal in the Week 1 Monday Night Football game were over. The fine folks over at Pro Football Talk have pointed us to another instance of a catch that is a borderline call. This one is harder to defend than the Texans touchdown upheld by replay.

On an 11-yard touchdown reception, Panthers receiver Dante Rosario lost control of the ball while scoring a touchdown (video). In light of the well-covered reversal last week, and the description given by the referee in that game, it would appear on first inspection that the Panthers touchdown would be overturned on replay.

The call on the replay review was that Rosario caught the ball in the field of play, got two feet down, then lunged for the end zone. If a receiver is not going to the ground, all that is required is two feet and possession of the ball for a perceivable amount of time (in other words, a freeze frame on replay is not enough to establish possession). Mike Pereira explained this to us in the preseason:

[If] contact comes almost simultaneously with the second foot hitting the ground … when we’re under the hood looking at these, we do run them in real time [for an] element of time that … is recognizable that he has control of the ball.

The call on the field by Don Carey indicated that the receiver completed the process of the catch in the field of play, and was not going to the ground until after the establishment of a catch. But, Carey said Rosario did this by performing “a second act” by reaching the ball over the plane of the goal line. This description comes dangerously close to reestablishing the “football move” verbiage that was abandoned in the definition of a catch. However, the spirit of the football-move guideline still exists if a player catches the ball, gets two feet down, and changes direction. Now, had the receiver caught the ball in stride, running parallel to the sideline instead of the goal line, this could have been ruled incomplete.

That said, I am not entirely sure that the receiver isn’t contacted before establishing the second foot for a recognizable element of time. This would mean, under such a opinion, that  the process of the catch would not be concluded until the player reaches the ground. In my judgment, I would rule incomplete, but I am not calling it a wrong call.

Back judge Terrence Miles and side judge Greg Meyer were covering the play.

Week 2: Texans at Titans

Back to Nashville we go for a fluke of a play that resulted in an extraordinary penalty. By the rules, it is a correct call.

At the end of the third quarter, the Texans’ Jacoby Jones (who just had narrowly escaped a potential replay reversal on his touchdown a quarter earlier) signaled for a fair catch and muffed the catch (video at 3:00). Jason McCourty was right there to catch the ball right out of the air for the Titans. However, Jones had signaled for a fair catch, and since the ball did not hit the ground, he was still entitled to a fair catch. And since McCourty caught the ball off the rebound, he was flagged for interference with a fair catch, a whopping 15-yard penalty. (Obviously, most cases of fair-catch interference involve defenseless receivers having the lumber laid down on them, so that is the basis for the yardage.)

Later in the fourth quarter, a sideline fracas broke out, in which Jason Jones of the Titans was disqualified after throwing a punch.

Walt Coleman was the referee.

Week 2: Texans at Titans

I knew once I saw the video of Jacoby Jones’s touchdown catch for the Texans that this would need explaining. It did not take long before and comment came in linking it to the Raiders’ overturned touchdown last week. (By the way, I vow that this is the last time that we will mention the Raider reversal—it has been thoroughly beaten to death.)

If you haven’t seen the play from the Texans game, here’s the video.

As we wrote last week, if a receiver is going to the ground, the receiver must maintain possession through to the ground. In the case of the Raiders touchdown, receiver Louis Murphy caught the ball, got two feet down, his butt landed in the end zone and then his torso landed. At that point the ball squirted out and touched the turf. By the rules, that is an incomplete pass, as the receiver did not maintain possession down to the ground.

As for the Texans touchdown, Jacoby Jones caught the ball falling to the ground. He bounced off of Cortland Finnegan of the Titans on his way to the ground. Finnegan then pulled Jones back down to the turf where Jones dropped the ball on the ground. The Raider Nation was looking for vindication: surely, this will be overturned on review.

Except the fact that the two plays are not the same.

When Jones lands on the opponent, he has gone to the ground, because the next thing that happens is that he gets pulled back up by Finnegan. Since Jones landed once, there is no requirement for him to land again on the ground. (Keep in mind, this is completely separate than the down-by-contact rule which says that the ball carrier is not down if he is on top of an opponent.) Had Finnegan not slightly lifted Jones, there might have been a case for a reversal.

In the Raiders situation, Murphy goes to the ground, first by his rear, and then continues downward. His rear contacting the ground is not enough (again, we are not applying the down-by-contact rules), as he was still going down to the ground.

I will admit it was a borderline call, but ultimately the right call. It was upheld on replay. Walt Coleman was the referee, Bill Spyksma was the replay official; as best I can tell, back judge Steve Freeman was covering on the play.

Week 2: Giants at Cowboys

The amazing interception by the Giants’ Kenny Phillips off of the foot of Cowboys’ Jason Witten (video) could be the first use of what might be referred to as the “Ed Hochuli rule.”

You may remember last year’s botched call in the Chargers–Broncos game where an incomplete pass ruling could not be overruled as a turnover.

In this weekend’s Sunday Night Football game, the ruling was incomplete. However, in a Rockette-worthy display, it actually caromed of the shoe of Witten into the waiting hands of Phillips. Phillips then trotted to the end zone untouched, although whistles did not blow until he was at the 5-yard line.

Mike Carey overturned the incomplete ruling on replay, but the ball in these situations, even if there is a delayed whistle, will go back to the spot of recovery. Even in the absence of the whistle, the covering official signaled incomplete, which is equivalent to a whistle.

And, yet, I find that this was not the most discussed pick in the game, but this was.

On a side note, there was to be no doubt if a punted ball banged off of the video screen with NBC’s cameras making sure that they showed the 600-ton hovering HDTV on all punts. Annoyingly, I might add.

Please use the comment space in this post for any calls or rules interpretations that you see in Week 2.