Tuesday Afternoon Linebacker

If you could change football what would you do? Would you change things drastically? Or just a little bit? TALB takes a little from column A and a little from column B. Some of my ideas are just plain out there. Others are rooted in reality. I hope you enjoy the 2006 edition of TALB’s King of Football.

General
12th Man
If a 12th player is on the field mistakenly and makes an attempt to leave the field no penalty will be assessed. The player will have to cross an imaginary line running parallel to the outside of the numbers, cross that line with 10 or more seconds remaining on the play clock, be no closer to the line of scrimmage than 5 yards, make no contact with any player for either team in the field of play, and make it out-of-bounds. Click for picture of the line (red, added by me). Thanks to Sports Know How for the graphic. The on-field officials can throw a flag if they are unsure if the player met all of the conditions. Replay review can then be used at the Referee’s discretion to decide.

Official Interference
If an official interferes with the execution of a play, the play will be called dead and the down replayed. This would include when a pass strikes an official (so long as an eligible receiver is close enough to have actually caught the ball otherwise). Or if an official, while moving, strikes an offensive or defensive player causing them to no longer be “in” the play.

NFL
Pass Interference
PI will be returned to a 15-yard, automatic first down infraction.
or
PI will be strictly defined such that the interference must have had a significant impact on either player’s ability to catch the ball.

Uniform Markings
Each NFL player will be allowed a single uniform marking to be placed on his jersey or helmet. The marking can be anything the player desires (memorial, favorite cause, etc). The marking will be subject to review by the team and/or league and must not be vulgar or offensive in any way. Markings can be patches or stickers applied to the jersey or helmet respectively, or hand written marks on the wrist bands or socks.

Veteran Salaries
Last time around I had proposed that veteran salaries be counted less against the salary cap once they reach certain milestones. TALB still favors something like that and thinks it would be more likely to occur. But I have another thought on the subject. Once the player reaches their milestone year, they can sign a contract heavy on performance incentives and less base salary. And in this scenario, the incentives would not count against the cap at all. Of course there would have to be safe-guards put in place to prevent abuse, but I think it could be done.

Colleges
Officiating
The on-field officials will be held accountable (via fines, suspension, or termination) for any injuries sustained as a result of their failure to stop play in a timely manner. Additionally, any further infraction that occurs as a result of the officials’ failure to stop a play in a timely fashion will not be assessed (except fighting).

The NCAA must choose an officiating crew for each bowl game from a conference of the same “stature” as the participating teams. That is, a bowl with at least one team from a BCS conference must use officials from another BCS conference.

Number Of Bowls
Currently there are 28 bowls. That is too many. TALB would reduce the number to 14 at the most. Reducing the number of teams involved from 56 to 28.

Bowl Eligibility
TALB would retain the 6 I-A wins requirement. Though each conference would only be able to submit three teams to bowl games. Each conference would be free to have their own method for determining this secondary bowl eligibility. All eligible independents can be considered for a bowl game.

For the 2005 season there were eleven Division I-A conferences and two eligible independent teams. That would have resulted in a pool of 35 schools for the 2005-6 bowl season.

Archive & Updates
The 2005 Edition.

Now I’ll look at the previous edition and see if any of it has become reality.

– MNF Start Time: Not quite. ESPN has said their MNF incarnation will begin at 8:40 PM. While the new premier game of the week, NBC’s Sunday Night Football will kick off at 8:15.

– MNF Flexible Scheduling: With the shift of the top game to SNF, this has come true. The NBC game will feature flexible scheduling at the end of the year.

– The Blown Whistle: According to Mike Pereira, during last year’s off-season there was a vote to remove the “blown whistle” restriction from replay. It failed by four votes. He has also said they will take another run at it this off-season.

Thanks for playing everyone.