# The NFL can't tell time **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [October 11, 2009, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452 "2009-10-11T23:06:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/21 "2009-10-12T02:42:04Z")
Unless you try to understand, you won’t. Nothing will make you enjoy football, but there really isn’t anything that should keep you from understanding what is going on. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/22 "2009-10-12T03:03:09Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Effectively, they do. Where would the NFL be without TV money? > > I’m also mildly surprised to hear that it is the NFL that sells the commercials and not the networks. It’s news to me; the league gets paid by the networks and gets the commercial money too? Does the NFL also sell the ads in the sports section of my newspaper? The networks can’t force the NFL to hold commercial timeouts. That’s a negotiated part of the deal; the NFL agrees to have such timeouts, and that increases the price they can charge for rights. Like it or not it’s the NFL’s call. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/23 "2009-10-12T03:09:26Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > The networks can’t force the NFL to hold commercial timeouts. That’s a negotiated part of the deal; the NFL agrees to have such timeouts, and that increases the price they can charge for rights. > > Like it or not it’s the NFL’s call. All right, I see your point now. I think we’re simply arriving at different destinations using the same directions. I think the NFL has sold its soul to TV. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/24 "2009-10-12T03:39:13Z")
> [@LH75](#): > > I guess those who are fans of this mind numbing game are happy enough, but I would much rather watch Sixty Minutes on time and then on to the regularly scheduled programming. Why does it take Sixty Minutes to watch Forty-five Minutes of news programming? Once you figure that one out, then you will have your answer, grasshopper. ---
**Author:** ![Bearflag70](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Bearflag70](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bearflag70)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/25 "2009-10-12T03:54:50Z")
I think it was Greg Easterbook who suggested a time saving measure of eliminating the 1 point PAT kick (over 95% success rate). A TD scores 7 unless the scoring team opts to deduct 1 point and attempt the 2 point try. Reading this thread, I suppose you could keep the clock running on out-of-bounds plays until the final 2 minutes. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/26 "2009-10-12T04:02:17Z")
> [@Bearflag70](#): > > Reading this thread, I suppose you could keep the clock running on out-of-bounds plays until the final 2 minutes. What you could also do is remove the completely arbitrary and ridiculous distinction between the final 2 minutes of each half, and the rest of the game. The two-minute warning is the biggest abomination and abortion of a “rule” ever incorporated into a sporting contest. It serves literally no purpose except to cram more advertising into the coverage. ---
**Author:** ![Erdosain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/erdosain/32/7284_2.png) [@Erdosain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erdosain)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/27 "2009-10-12T04:02:51Z")
The real question is why CBS insists on airing 60 Minutes at 7 Eastern when it knows damn well that the game will always go over. My theory? They hate old people. ---
**Author:** ![ToeJam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@ToeJam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ToeJam)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/28 "2009-10-12T04:47:46Z")
> [@LH75](#): > > No, my friend, it is not. Why does there have to be such long stretches of game time with the clock not running? Why do the end of some plays stop the clock and others not? If comercials are the reason the game runs long, why don’t they have commercials while everyone is standing around anyway? > [@LH75](#): > > Friend Ro0sh > > None of this explains to those of us who do not care about the minutia of the rules of a game that we do not care about why a game with a one hour time limit needs to take four hours to play. As commercials aren’t the only reason that the game will run long- a high school or college football game that’s not televised will also take longer than an hour just due to the game itself. But if you weren’t looking for an actual answer, then I suppose you WERE asking a rhetorical question and not just asking for more information. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/29 "2009-10-12T04:58:05Z")
> [@LH75](#): > > I have to admit I am not a sports fan. Any given five minutes of this game looks exactly like any other given five minutes. I do not get the appeal. I am not entirely unsympathetic to your position; it doesn’t make a damn bit of sense that a nominally 60-minute football game takes more than 90 minutes to play, and things are even worse in college football. However, I have to ask: which bits of 60 Minutes look different from any of the other bits? The ending credits, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/30 "2009-10-12T05:56:43Z")
> [@Bearflag70](#): > > I think it was Greg Easterbook who suggested a time saving measure of eliminating the 1 point PAT kick (over 95% success rate). A TD scores 7 unless the scoring team opts to deduct 1 point and attempt the 2 point try. > > Reading this thread, I suppose you could keep the clock running on out-of-bounds plays until the final 2 minutes. Wow. I think that’s an awesome idea! PATs are un-timed downs, so they really do nothing but add to the length of time the game is on without the benefit off burning actual game time. ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/31 "2009-10-12T05:59:09Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > The real question is why CBS insists on airing 60 Minutes at 7 Eastern when it knows damn well that the game will always go over. My theory? They hate old people. Ugh! I hate playing Television Roulette with my DVR! I go to watch Cold Case, and I’m stuck watching 45 minutes of The Amazing Race. I guess I just need to record the news for an hour at the end of programming on Sunday because of games running long. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/32 "2009-10-12T07:01:54Z")
> [@Bearflag70](#): > > I think it was Greg Easterbook who suggested a time saving measure of eliminating the 1 point PAT kick (over 95% success rate). A TD scores 7 unless the scoring team opts to deduct 1 point and attempt the 2 point try. Special teams are just as much a part of the game as the offense or defense and not making them perform takes out a whole dimension of the game. Sometimes PATs miss and, even moreso, sometimes they miss in ways that have a very serious impact on the game. You miss that PAT and are not up 20-17 instead of 21-17, so now your opponent needs to only make a field goal to tie you. You lose that whole aspect of the game, and kickers lose almost half of their job because this will cut out maybe 5 minutes in a game unless it’s really high scoring. It’s just not worth it. And you’ll see even fewer 2 point tries now because part of the equation is that yes a PAT is a high chance, but it’s not guaranteed. Hell, when it’s an important PAT you’ll actually see the defense put in a serious amount of effort to attempt to block it rather than the half-assed attempt you might see in the middle of the second quarter. Oh, and now there’s no chance for a fake or anything like that either. So even less worth it. If PATs are really eating up a lot of time, just make them timed plays, with clock stoppage before and after, and still happen if at the end of a quarter. > [@](#): > > Reading this thread, I suppose you could keep the clock running on out-of-bounds plays until the final 2 minutes. Except that in a lot of games, the clock matter much sooner than just the last 2 minutes. If you’re down by two scores, you might start trying to conserve the clock at 6-8 minutes. Besides, as someone else mentioned up thread, one of the major strategic points of the game is clock management. If it becomes a complete non-issue until the last 2 minutes, that’s one more dimension of the game that you take away. You won’t see a lot less difference between a team that eats up the clock on a 12 play scoring drive and another team that keeps having stalled drives with lots of incomplete passes. If they really want to speed up the game without impacting the quality, there’s plenty of other ways to do it. For instance, just dropping a couple seconds from the play clock. Right now it’s 40/25, they could easily change it to something like 35/25 or 35/20 and it would speed up the game quite a bit. They could potentially add rules to reduce substitutions (eg, only change line-up twice for each set of downs instead of every down) which is a large part of what often pushes teams right to the edge of the play clock. Another annoying thing is that they do commercial breaks immediately before and immediately after a kick-off; pick one of those breaks and get rid of it, they can add some extra commercials in at other times to make up for it, but there’s no need for a 2-3 minute break, 15s of play, then another 2-3 minute break. And while I’m on ads, they could easily shorten a lot of the commercial breaks without losing revenue. Some slow parts of the game could easily allow for the game area to be shrunk down and have some kinds of banner adds or whatever. They could do that when they’re reviewing a play, when the officials are discussing stuff, and occassionally during longer uneventful stretches. Hell, it might even give the commentators a chances to shut up so they’re not stuck rambling as long and end up saying something dumb. Also, do something about the time wasted with officiating. I appreciate that they want to get things right, but there doesn’t need to be a conference as often as there is. Usually the one with the best view of the penalty or the call is the one who should be trusted, so I don’t know what someone across the field really needs to say unless he definitely saw something the other guy may not have. The league could easily have some kind of quota for those little meetings and give some kind of incentive to the refs for keeping them below a certain length of time. I’ve definitely seen some of those take in excess of 5 minutes, and so it only takes a few of them to add a noticeable amount of time to the game. Between all of that, they could probably easily cut out 20+ minutes on average. ---
**Author:** ![magnusblitz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@magnusblitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magnusblitz)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/33 "2009-10-12T07:31:55Z")
> [@Blaster\_Master](#): > > Another annoying thing is that they do commercial breaks immediately before and immediately after a kick-off; This is my biggest annoyance with the ads. Sometimes it’ll happen during punts too, which is even more ridiculous. Its kill any momentum in a game and there’s no reason for it at all other than advertising (unlike say, other stoppages that are game-related, like the 2 minute warning). Interestingly enough, during the Ravens-Bengals game today, near the end of the game, they kept trying to cut away to a commercial, would get one in, and then need to switch back to the game because play had resumed. Seems they weren’t going to let a little commercial time interrupt them too much. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/34 "2009-10-12T07:40:52Z")
> [@magnusblitz](#): > > This is my biggest annoyance with the ads. Sometimes it’ll happen during punts too, which is even more ridiculous. Its kill any momentum in a game and there’s no reason for it at all other than advertising (unlike say, other stoppages that are game-related, like the 2 minute warning). The two-minute warning is “game-related” in the sense that it is part of the rules, but it serves no logical purpose other than adding _another_ stoppage to a sport that already has far too many. Functionally, it’s no different from a simple ad stoppage. Are football fans and players so retarded that they actually need a stoppage in play, with an ad break, to tell them that there’s two minutes left on the game clock? Not sure about you, but i have no trouble reading the little clock in the top corner of my TV screen to see how long there is to go. ---
**Author:** ![Crawlspace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Crawlspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crawlspace)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/35 "2009-10-12T07:53:06Z")
> [@Enright3](#): > > Wow. I think that’s an awesome idea! PATs are un-timed downs, so they really do nothing but add to the length of time the game is on without the benefit off burning actual game time. You can say this about most of football stoppages. Why should the clock stop because some guy got 1/4" out of bounds? ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/36 "2009-10-12T10:14:23Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > The two-minute warning is “game-related” in the sense that it is part of the rules, but it serves no logical purpose other than adding _another_ stoppage to a sport that already has far too many. Functionally, it’s no different from a simple ad stoppage. > > Are football fans and players so retarded that they actually need a stoppage in play, with an ad break, to tell them that there’s two minutes left on the game clock? Not sure about you, but i have no trouble reading the little clock in the top corner of my TV screen to see how long there is to go. Considering that the origin of the two-minute warning was to make sure everyone knew how much time was left before the scoreboard clock was the official clock, it wasn’t stupid. And I like the time management aspects of the two-minute warning. Other notes: Outside of the two-minute timing rules, running out of bounds does not stop the clock for more than a few seconds. Getting rid of the PAT kick was stupid when the XFL did it and it would stupid for the NFL to do it in the other direction. I agree that they should cut out some of the commercials around kickoffs and punts. Face it, football is a game that simply takes more than one hour to play. Even when I was going to high school games, those still took at least two hours, and that was with 12-minute quarters. I say that it is stupid that soccer takes more than 90 minutes to play because of halftime and it’s stupid the way the clock is never stopped, resulting in an unknown amount of “extra” time. How about that it takes 40 minutes to play 2 minutes of basketball with all the timeouts and intentional fouling? If you want to watch your Sunday night TV on time, move to the Mountain zone. A late football game starts at 2:15 and is over by 6:00, when 60 Minutes starts, and then the rest of primetime starts at 7:00. Other bonuses: Sunday Night and Monday Night football start at 6:30, even the latest baseball playoff game starts no later than 7:30, and you can watch an entire game of Monday Night Football and then catch Letterman at 10:30. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/37 "2009-10-12T14:51:43Z")
Here’s the better question: Why do the networks schedule a full night of prime-time programming after a football game that they know will almost never end until 7:30? It’s no use arguing whether football games “should” take 3+ hours or not. The fact is, they do, they have for the last fifty years, and they aren’t going to change. The second game starts at 4:15 and is _expected_ to run until 7:30. So what’s the point of scheduling Sixty Minutes for 7:00 and making an announcement _every fucking week_ that “if you’re expecting to see Sixty Minutes, it’s going to be late this week”? Duh. It’s going to be late _every week_ between September and January. Schedule it at 7:30, drop half an hour of prime-time programming, and most of the time your schedule can remain in place. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/38 "2009-10-12T15:10:51Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > Here’s the better question: Why do the networks schedule a full night of prime-time programming after a football game that they know will almost never end until 7:30? > > It’s no use arguing whether football games “should” take 3+ hours or not. The fact is, they do, they have for the last fifty years, and they aren’t going to change. The second game starts at 4:15 and is _expected_ to run until 7:30. So what’s the point of scheduling Sixty Minutes for 7:00 and making an announcement _every fucking week_ that “if you’re expecting to see Sixty Minutes, it’s going to be late this week”? Duh. It’s going to be late _every week_ between September and January. Schedule it at 7:30, drop half an hour of prime-time programming, and most of the time your schedule can remain in place. Fox (the other network which carries NFL games on Sunday afternoons) seems to be able to do this, because all of their Sunday evening shows are half-hour programs, so it’s easier to just bump one. Also, it looks like, at least for this season, Fox isn’t even bothering to start their non-football programming until 8pm on Sundays during football season. CBS, OTOH, has four one-hour programs scheduled on Sunday evenings, making it harder for them to bump a half-hour’s worth of programming. Also, just to note…not every “late” game starts at 4:15 Eastern. If the network has the “doubleheader” (Fox and CBS alternate weeks for running doubleheaders), the late game starts at 4:15; if it’s a non-doubleheader week for the network, the late games (usually West Coast games) start at 4. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/39 "2009-10-12T15:32:13Z")
Why does the end of 60 Minutes drag on much longer than necessary? All they need to do is cut “A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney.” I know I for one do not need to know any more about how Andy Rooney sleeps, or what Andy Rooney does with his vacation time. I thought his piece on how horrible it was to be on vacation from work all of that time and only now getting back to the job was quite tone-deaf during this economy, and his suggestion that we are all sleeping too much based on the fact that he does was extreme stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2009, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452/40 "2009-10-12T15:40:28Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > Why does the end of 60 Minutes drag on much longer than necessary? All they need to do is cut “A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney.” No kidding. His piece a week ago was awful…he started with complaining that the USPS wants to close a bunch of smaller post offices in a cost-cutting move, but somehow segued to the fact that no one sends snail-mail letters anymore, and that he hates junk mail, and wishes that people still sent each other real letters. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-nfl-cant-tell-time/513452.md?page=3)