NFC Divisional Playoff
We will be live blogging the calls and rules interpretations from the Saints-49ers game.
If you have any questions or comments, use the comments section of this post, or tweet us @footballzebras.
The referee is John Parry. Full crew listings are at the bottom of this post.
[liveblog]
- R — #132 John Parry (12th year, 5th as referee)
- U — #64 Dan Ferrell (9th year)
- HL — #74 Derick Bowers (9th year)
- LJ — #59 Rusty Baynes (2nd year)
- FJ — #3 Scott Edwards (13th year)
- SJ — #7 Keith Washington (4th year)
- BJ — #2 Billy Smith (18th year)*
- Alternates — Mike Spanier (#90, LJ from Walt Coleman’s crew), Kirk Dornan (#6, BJ from Mike Carey’s crew)
*Smith is a substitute from Walt Anderson’s crew.
Timeout request has to be made to an official. To which official did Brees make his request?
The back judge saw it. If it is seen by the official, it is granted. Although the rule says “request for a timeout by the head coach or any player to any official,” I think that it would be exceedingly technical to not allow it unless eye contact is made with the official. Rather, the rule is properly read that the timeout is granted by the official, and not merely based upon the T signal.
on the Pierre Thomas fumble- even if he is not a defenseless opponent isn’t it a personal foul if the defender uses his helmet to initiate contact?
the reason that an open-field runner is not counted is that (1) the runner who is under his own power can do things to induce a helmet-to-helmet hit (such as lower his head or turn), and (2) the runner also has the ability to avoid the contact and react to it. You can also, legally, blindside a runner as well, as long as there is no other unnecessary roughness on the play.
Why wasn’t a penalty (late hit or unsportsmanlike conduct) called when a SF 49er pushed Jed Collins after the play was over and he was getting up out of bounds?
Collins reached back and grabbed the facemask (not intentionally) and there was a push back. Side judge Keith Washington was quick to wave that off.
Technically, both could have been called, but they are going to let small stuff like that go.