B1G new targeting rule: automatic ejection
From BTN's Tom Dienhart at B1G Officials Conference today: hits above the shoulders will result in automatic ejection. The only way I see this working is if the officials are allowed to review replay. Really hard to make these calls in real time, especially in situations where the ballcarrier ducks or slides at the last second. Replay official could have an even more significant role in the game. Not sure what he means by "conclusive evidence" to overturn. And if it is overturned, does the penalty flag get picked up?
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 5h
If a player is flagged for delivering a blow above the shoulders in 2013, #B1G officials coordinator Bill Carollo says he will be ejected.
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 4h
Per rule language, the only way for a player to avoid ejection for a high hit is if replay official has conclusive evidence to the contrary.
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 2h
@DesmondHoward isn't a big fan of the new targeting rule. And this is coming from an offensive player.
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 24m
Message is clear at #B1G officials clinic: If there is ANY doubt in a ref's mind that a player was targeted for a hit, flag will be tossed.
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 22m
Officials are being shown a series of hard hits and asked to vote if hit is foul and targeting. I'll just say this: get ready for ejections.
Tom Dienhart @BTNTomDienhart 18m
This is apparent: #B1G office does NOT want to have to make decisions on suspensions on Mondays. Wants it done on Saturdays by referees.
Great, more time wasted going to the booth for review.
Yep! I'm all for safety, but this will be like the elbows rule in basketball where we need to stop play for five minutes three or four times a game to make sure.
They need to make these evaluations after the game unless it is blatant and unmistakable. When it is beyond the shadow of the doubt, eject the guy. But if you need a review to figure it out, do that on Sunday and eject the guy from the following game if you determine it was intentional.
If there is any doubt in the ref's mind, the order is to eject. Which makes no sense to me. Football moves way too fast to be ejecting players if you are not sure if the hit was targeting or not. Like Desmond said, it is a contact sport. There are going to be times when a player may hit above the shoulders unintentionally as it is hard to determine how an offensive player will react.
Tweet number two indicates that the replay official is involved in the ejection process.
It is unclear if a review is automatic though. Does the replay booth have to initiate it? Under the current rules, if the offensive team snaps the ball before the replay initiated, that player would be gone. With a penalty and the discussion between the ref crew about ejection, I am assuming the booth would get a good look at replay before play would be restarted, but I have a feeling this is going to end up a giant cluster****.
This is going to be a disaster.
Fucking clown show.
Given it is the B1G, is anyone surprised?
I bet it'll be everyone before too long.
Well, maybe not the SEC
You mean the best conference in the game that makes fools out of everyone on the field?
Alabama isn't a conference.
I'd say LSU, Georgia, Florida, Texas A&M count as the SEC.
Those teams didn't make fools out of everyone on the field. Heck, two of them lost their bowl game.
Every one of those teams would beat every team in the B1G.
It's sad but that is what this conference is. We're so far behind the SEC it's sad.
and supposing that one would be favored to beat two, ect. OSU would be favored against every one of those teams and Michigan would be for everyone but Georgia, for whatever that's worth.
Not sure why you were downvoted here. The SEC is a great conference, the best in the country. But outside of Alabama I wouldn't say any has been dominant save for those couple of Florida teams under Meyer that apparently were filled with criminals.
OSU safeties aren't going to finish a game.
OSU safeties aren't going to finish a single game.
I think this actually hurts player safety as officials may be much more reluctant to call the penalty knowing it's an automatic ejection.
I bet you officials are going to start calling "unnecessary roughness" in cases where they previously had called "targetting" in cases where it is definitely a penalty but not worthy of ejection
Fucking stupid idea.
This seems dumb. Just introduce the concept that your are ejected after X personal fouls, or Y unnecessary roughness calls, with automatic multigame suspensions for repeat offenders. Even if you aren't targetting, you deserve the ejection just for being such a sloppy player.
Then if coaches start platooning their guys to get more fouls in, just introduce the concept of team foul trouble, say after some number of total fouls in a game, your personal fouls become 25 yards and loss of down (or auto first down if you are on defense).
eject the head coach after a certain number like they do in hockey.
I don't know whether this announced change will help or not, but football relies way too much on supposing a coach/team wouldn't intentionally play a dirty game for my liking. This seems like a step to swing the scales in the other direction.
Yeah, we can call it the Narduzzi Rule.
How many truly dirty regimes are there out there, though? An obvious example is Miami (YTM) of the 80s and 90s, and MSU whenever they happen to play Michigan. Anyone have any other clear examples where this rule might come into play?
Actually dirty regimes are somewhat rare I think. This comes more into play when one team is physically overmatched and is amoral enough to attempt to pull out a victory via hacking at people's ACLs and shit like that. Or when one team has a really talented player and it is worth a personal foul or two to attempt to knock that player out of the game or at least get in his head.
I wonder if this was coming as early as March when the NCAA Rules Oversight Committee approved basically this very same thing as well - (LINK to release).
Indeed, on further reading, it looks like it is already in the Division I Football rules for 2013 as Ruling 9-1-4, and this is the example they give officials as reference:
"Receiver A83 has just leaped and received a forward pass. As A83 is about to regain his balance, B45 launches and drives into A83 above the shoulder area with his helmet or shoulder. RULING: Foul by B45 for targeting and initiating contact with a defenseless opponent above the shoulders. Ejection for a flagrant foul."
Referencing back to the rule itself also mentions the video review and the potential for postgame conferences to discuss additional sanctions as they see fit.
The spirit is fine with this rule, but asking referees who only sometimes call PI and holding correctly to accurately identify dangerous hits is a fool's errand. I fully expect more ejections early on, followed by enough blowback that the refs just starting calling unnecessary roughness to save them the hassle.
There is a bit of a misunderstanding that may be created by the title of this post: this is not by any means a Big Ten rule; it is an NCAA rule. The "tweets" in the original post are simply reports of a discussion of the NCAA rule by the Big Ten's director of officials.
Reference: rule change #1 listed in the link below.
https://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/public/ncaa/playing+rules+administ…
Also note rule change #8, (numerals must be of a contrasting color) which I suspect is yet another rule that was added as a direct result of something that happened in a Michigan game.
i'd like to see some specific examples of what exactly they'll be ejecting for.
I guess I'm in the big minority here, but I think this is a good rule. The two rules that seem relevant are worded...
- No player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown (top) of his helmet. When in question, it is a foul.
- No player shall target and initiate contact to the head or neck area of a defenseless opponent with the helmet, forearm, elbow or shoulder. When in question, it is a foul
It should be pretty obvious on the first one if the defender is targeting or initiating contact with their head. Basically, don't launch yourself.
The second one seems to be able to be avoided by trying to wrap up the player. If you're wrapping up instead of just trying to make a big hit, I don't see how you can get caught up in the second one.
So Jadaveon Clowney would have been ejected in the Outback Bowl this past January?
He didn't lead with the top of his helmet. He had his head up. Smith wasn't in a defensless position, so the second rule doesn't apply. Doesn't seem like it fits the description to me.
This isn't technically a change in what is permitted and what is forbidden. It is only a change in the penalty assessed for violating the rule--anything that was not a penalty last year is not a penalty this year. The only difference is that now the player committing the infraction is ejected.
Talk about a subjective rule, just quit pussyfying the game, I'm all for safety but I can just see this rule botched more times than not.
I bet Desmond would be all in favor of an automatic ejection for defensive players hitting or tripping receivers in the end zone before the ball arrives.
The overwhelmingly negative reaction in this thread is the reason why, despite all the hand-wringing about the danger of head injuries, football will have a hard time making the necessary changes to protect players from long-term brain damage.
We can talk all we want about our worried about long-term damage, but until significant changes happen in the way the game is played, players will continue to suffer an unsustainable quantity of concussions and other brain-damaging hits. And we will lament dead players like Junior Seau, and living ones like Leroy Hoard.
But either football fixes itself, or some government action (a serious lawsuit, or congressional action) fixes it in ways that we don't want.
The purpose of this rule is to make all players think about head hits before any kind of collision. They may have to change the way they play; so be it. These changes must happen. I'll probably hate some of the calls, but this is what football needs to do to save itself from a catastrophic implosion.
The overwhelmingly negative reaction of this thread is because this is a stupid f'ing rule.
The way to handle targeting is to analyze the game the day after the game, and then suspend the hell ouf of players that are obviously targeting people.
The way to make a circus act out of it is to take 7 (or 8 if you include the replay guy) guys who, when asked if a play is a fumble or an incomplete pass are right as often as a coin-flip, to make a snap decision on whether a defender was targeting on a play, and then immediately eject him from a game, thus permanently altering the outcome of the game and the season for both teams even though there is probably a large chance they are wrong.
The problem isn't having a targeting rule. I'm all for that. You can take your time, analyze the plentiful game tape, figure out that a play was a target, and then suspend the player IN DUE TIME WITH DUE PROCESS. Don't force guys that already are in over their heads to make snap decisions that carry mandatory ejections.
This rule is a clown car circus act just waiting to drive into the tent. There is no way college football refs are up to this challenge. Hell, NFL refs couldn't possibly handle it either.
Well if it effects conference titles for us, I'll take it.
September 1st, 2013 at 2:16 AM ^
The targeting rule is such bullst --- the offensive player is doing anythign to avoid being hit ad the defensive player is trying to anticipate the other players move in a split second - less than reaction time allows -- wish the fat ass officials at NCAA who make these rules woiuld try to stop a running back or QB on an end-run and decide in a split-second wheher to lay-down the shoiulder or not -- gee -- if you're leading with your shoiulder aren't you also leading with your head which is located right next to your shoulder? PENALTY!!!
What a stooped rule!
IT'S KIND Of like building permit and zoning rules -- justs sets up for somone to be paid off!
Wonder what it costs to get an official to call a "targeting" violation -- I guess it depends on how importan tthe game is.