Even if you don’t draft Luck, with the new CBA that pick will be the most valuable #1 in a decade trade-wise. Either St. Louis or Minnesota can benefit from having more picks to fill needs. If Luck has a great year this year and with Franchise QB’s being a premium in the NFL, you could even see a near-Ricky Williams level trade.
Heh, that is a pretty great quote.
Ah, one innocuous post and suddenly it is the “goal of the thread”. I suggest that if you get your panties in a twist over something like that you might do yourself some good if you do stay out of it.
Yes, let’s ask who’s bringing content to the thread. Certainly your threadshitting far outpaced my contributions.
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He did what he thought he did. If the question is whether or not he gave himself up, the fact he abandoned the ball and was heading back to the huddle seems a pretty clear indication that yes, he gave himself up. Were he attempting to go forward with the ball, I’d likely agree with you. But I thought it was pretty clear that he considered himself down.
“What I thought I did” and “what I did” are often different - that’s why there are rules that (should) clearly define the plays without regard for intent. It’s the player’s job to make that intent clear. What I’ve always thought (and this was said by Harrison and/or Dungy at some point last night as well) is that you give yourself up by sliding feet-first. If you go head first, the assumption is that you’re still trying to gain yards.
I think it was a bad call, but it’s also a badly written rule.
The rule actually doesn’t say anything about the player making it clear. But I agree, the rule is poorly written. I think something could be added to the effect if a player clearly gives up the ball of their own volition while on the ground the player shall be deemed to have ended the play. Something like that.
I think a wiser rule would be the runner must go to the ground with possession of the ball and make no attempt to advance or get up until a referee blows the whistle. Once the referee blows the whistle, the play is dead and not before.
Collinsworth was bitching half the night about how the Ravens kept passing after they were up 20. As shaky as the Jets’ line looked without Mangold, why help them out by giving their D an opportunity to make plays?
Some coaches just insist on overthinking it. I bet if Harbaugh were asked, he’d insist that they’ve gotta run “their offense,” or something along those lines, instead of doing the logical thing by running the ball. I saw it on Saturday during Michigan State-Ohio State. MSU was up 10-0 late, and they gave up a long TD pass after blitzing and leaving everyone in single coverage. Why are you blitzing, Mark Dantonio?! Play your basic nickel or dime package and don’t let anyone beat you deep. Basic!
But as we’ve seen the rule isn’t written that way, nor is it the case in practice that that’s the only way to give yourself up. You see it somewhat commonly with interceptions at the end of games: a defender picks off a pass, starts to run it back, then he realizes that his team can’t possibly lose so long as he doesn’t fumble, so he promptly crumples to the ground without being touched – play over.
Some people have brought up, as evidence that the call was blown, Cruz’s post-game comments, in which he said that he thought he’d been touched. It seems like he didn’t know the rule, but that doesn’t really matter because he *also *said after the game that (paraphrasing) he went down on purpose because they were in the hurry-up and he wanted to get back to the line of scrimmage. IOW, his intent was to end the play, and, fortunately for him, the rules say he did just that by intentionally going to the ground and stopping his progress. The only way to claim the refs made a mistake is to say that Cruz *actually *stumbled and went to the ground involuntarily, but both the video and testimonial evidence would seem to speak against that conclusion.
Whether he intended to give himself up or not, whether he actually did give himself up or not, is moot. The only controversy is whether the officials recognized an attempt to give himself up and blew a whistle signaling a dead ball. Whistle=no fumble, no whistle=fumble. You don’t abandon the football if no whistle was blown regardless of what you think and if a whistle did blow, there was no abandonment.
So, was there a whistle blown before Arizona recovered the ball?
[QUOTE=Hamlet]
But I thought it was pretty clear that he considered himself down.
[/QUOTE]
Which means nothing, per above.
Sort of, but replay’s thrown a wrench into this as well. In questionable cases, the officials are now trained to not blow the whistle and let play continue, then decide later whether the ball was actually dead or not. It allows for both possible outcomes to be considered - a quick whistle only gives you one choice.
I don’t think so, but NYG kept the ball.
Umm, no it’s not.
"Rule 7, Section 4, Article 1
Dead Ball Rule
An official shall declare dead ball and the down ended:
(a) when a runner is out of bounds or declares himself down by falling to the ground and makes no effort to advance."
and
"“When a runner declares himself down by sliding feet first on the ground. The ball is dead the instant the runner touches the ground with anything other than his hands or his feet; or … when a runner is out of bounds, or declares himself down by falling to the ground, or kneeling, and making no effort to advance.”
(NOTE: I’m not sure which is the precise wording, but they’re both quite close")
Again, not true. As the rules says, the guy is down, play over.
I agree that he SHOULDN’T have abandoned the football, just to be safe. But the fact it happened before the whistle was blown doesn’t make a non-fumble a fumble. Had Cruz gone out of bounds or his knee was down in the usual way, but the whistle is late, that doesn’t mean the ball coming out is a fumble.
Do you have a cite for your assertions?
The college rule is different in that when you hit the ground, it doesn’t matter if you’ve been touched. I have seen a rookie receiver* leaping to make the catch and going to the ground untouched, then dropping the ball and it being ruled a fumble. Would that be a dead ball under current rules? Should it be?
- Plaxico Burress, I believe, but whatever.
Everybody remember this, when MJD kneeled down before the endzone. Of course very little similarity, clearly taking a knee and giving up the pay, holding onto the ball, and an extremely obvious benefit to taking a knee. And as others have mentioned, defensive players frequently give up on a play when they get an interception to seal a victory to end a game.
I think Victor Cruz went down on purpose, but I don’t think he thought he was stopping the play simply by going down, but I do think he thought he would get touched and the play would be over. So I do believe he was trying to end the play, but I am guessing he didn’t know about the giving oneself up option. I personally think the call should have been fumble, but I also see how it can be interpreted the other way. The rule is simply to broad.
Whether Cruz went down on purpose or stumbled down is less important to me than the fact that he turtled once he was down there. Curling up into a ball like that is pretty obviously giving yourself up.
So, who wants to come up with a new Monday Night Football theme?
Heh. He had to have been drunk or stoned or both. Link.
ARE YOU READY FOR SOME…fascism?
My immediate reaction before he even fumbled the ball or the play was whistled down or anything was “smart move, giving yourself up.” That was my immediate, gut reaction.
Everyone on the broadcast disagreed, and they seemed offended by how badly the call was blown. Tony Dungy garbled his way through some murky objection about giving yourself up has to be feet first, apparently unaware of examples like the MJD one, and I think Tomlinson did it too while he was with the Chargers.
Then Eli’s post-game comments and Cruz himself saying he thought he was touched, I was curious how only I (and the refs, apparently) saw it one way while the rest of the world saw it differently.
So I taped a bunch of ESPN today to hear the various talking heads. Mike & Mike both thought it was a good call and an easy, obvious one to make. On Sportscenter, Merril Hodge thought it was a good call while Tim Hasselback thought it was terrible. On Around the Horn, the panelists were 3-1 saying it was a good call, while on PTI both Tony & Wilbon thought the call was awful, bordering on a joke.
All told, my sampling of day-after pundits came in 6-4 in favor of it being a good call, though the four opposed seemed to think it was the end of the world. They were weirdly pissed about it. Counting the broadcasters during the game and the postgame show, I think that was another 5 against (Two announcers, Dungy & the guy next to him, and Pereira) so 9-6 against.
As Merrill Hodge said, this type of thing is considered a judgement call (similar to forward progress) because multiple people can see the same thing differently.