You keep saying “complete control” as if you’ve defined it. As far as I can tell, “complete control” is whatever you (or some random official) think it is? You can understand why some people might not be comfortable with that level of specificity, right? And that that discomfort was the reason for the rule change? And…

I don’t mind rewarding the defense in the scenario you described, but look at the ASJ or Gurley “fumbles” from earlier this year. In both cases they clearly had possession, were runners, and broke the plane. TD, end of play. But because they dropped the ball AFTER it broke the plane (again, when the play should have…

How so? It makes clear what would otherwise be a murky play that would require a subjective interpretation of how long James had “control” of the ball before it hit the ground and was dislodged. What if it had come out of his hands completely when it hit the ground? What if a defender had touched him while his knee…

What do you mean who cares? EVERYBODY cares! That’s what we’re even talking about. Because you can have complete control of something and then drop it in, like, a billionth of a second. Right now I’m holding a tennis ball in my hand. Completely controlling it in every sense of the wor....WHOOPS I JUST DROPPED IT ON…

But you’re not saying for how LONG you have to have complete control, and you’re accepting that that decision should be made by some jamoke in a striped shirt because...humanity? This rule takes the subjectivity out of it. I just don’t understand why anyone would want MORE vague subjectivity in a sport of inches...Go…

Not in the NFL they don’t. Not anymore. And it wasn’t that long ago that people were enraged by NFL officials on a weekly basis because of subjective calls. SO the league did something about it, and now you almost never hear anything about individual officials because expanded replay and specificity in the rules has…

But you’re arguing that you don’t have to be on the ground to have caught the ball and had it count as a reception. In your thinking, a player could be in mid air, grab the ball, pull it to his chest for a split second, and then immediately drop it and that would be considered a catch because at SOME point during the…

So who gets to decide what “clear” means on any given play? Jeff Triplette? The whole point of the rule was so that we didn’t have to have the officials making judgement calls on what “clear” or “football move” meant. It really is perfectly analogous to the two-feet-in-bounds rule. It’s a layer of specificity the…

Um, I don’t agree that he secured it? And that’s the point? I don’t consider it secured (and neither does the NFL, apparently) until he’s finished falling and not using the ground to help him secure it.

You’re right that it wouldn’t lead to that many more LOST fumbles (most of them would be technically recovered right away or fumbled out of bounds). But what it would do is allow receivers to use the ground to help secure catches and how many ways do we need to give offenses a further advantage? I don’t really…

It’s adding ONE additional requirement which doesn’t seem like that obtuse of one at that. I guess you can argue you don’t like it because you want to see more catches and more fumbles. I don’t think there’s much sense in arguing a personal opinion like that. But I honestly don’t see why this is more onerous a rule…

I’m all for speeding up games. But I disagree that the rule doesn’t offer anything to better the sport. I mean the definition of a strike in MLB is incredibly specific in the rulebook but no umpire is ever really held to the standard of calling them by the letter of the rule. In the NFL they’ve decided to use replay…

I’ve said it in another comment, but I’m totally fine with the concept of letting the officials run the game like in soccer. But don’t kid yourself that it will somehow lead to LESS strife than a complicated rule book. You think any amount of training is going to lead to 100% right calls? These guys know the sport…

It makes perfect sense. You just described measuring things to analyze them. That’s, like, science. You’re saying you’d rather have the games decided by officials in real time the way baseball umpires call balls and strikes with impunity. And I totally respect that take, I just don’t believe it would somehow lead to…

They don’t trust their officials because they shouldn’t. People are dumb computers with a big ol’ piece of meat for a processor. Imagine if we let Angel Hernandez decide whether or not that was a TD. Tell me there would not be a billion white hot takes all over the soc med’s this morning.

I said it in another comment but I’ll repeat it: the alternative is to let the officials run the game as they see fit like in soccer with very little recourse if you don’t like their subjective call. You can make an argument for this (it speeds up the game, it relies on common sense, etc), but you know damn well the…

People need to forget the term “football move” ever existed. It was taken out of the rulebook years ago specifically because no one could agree what it meant.

Your thesis assumes that the Steelers are somehow more likable than the Patriots. Personally, when these two teams play I root for Bane to blow up the field but for Hines Ward to somehow not escape this time.

So forget about the plain for a second. What if this had happened in the middle of the end zone? Then you’re saying that it’s a TD as soon as it hits the receiver’s hands and that obviously doesn’t work.

I don’t get the hand wringing on this thing anymore. It’s actually a very clear rule and has been enforced perfectly consistently for years now. Every team has had it go against them on a big play at least once. You have to have control of the ball all the way to the ground. They put the rule in there exactly so there…