Quite an impressive list of comments, and I appreciate the ones that didn't completely expound beyond the post or were baselessly derogatory. Pretty harsh, but somewhat expected as well.
I didn't really get all the points to prove that Bama has at times benefited from flukes when I qualified an opinion about that in the first paragraph of the original post.
I remember watching Quincy Jackson catch our only two touchdowns of the 1998 LSU after the defender deflected under-thrown balls and didn't exactly feel great about that either. We were outplayed that day and could've easily lost. However, those deflections didn't really involve someone making an awful decision during the plays.
I also found it interesting how some would think cleaning up flukes (it's not like they happen often on a team-by-team basis) would make football "perfect" and "boring"; there are numerous completely intended things that happen on a field that are the height of excitement. Ball-hawk interceptions, soul-jarring sacks, 80-yard play-action bombs, on and on... And there are also many plays that get lumped in as flukes that don't fit the parameters I gave. Johnny's 2012 fumbled-snap touchdown isn't a fluke, Kick Six isn't a fluke - it was just the result of a horrible decision to kick while pitting nine lineman, a punter who was holding and a kicker against a cornerback, from there simple physics took over.
I'd like to back up and just ask: In a perfect world (because that's all this is really, a hypothetical argument about a question I've never heard asked), could the game be officiated to keep the team making the mistake from being rewarded.
Or, if onside kicks can be advanced by the receiving team, but NOT the kicking team once it is recovered or if a pass attempt can be blown dead if it first hits an offensive lineman, instituting a rule where at the least a deflected catch could count as a completion but couldn't be advanced doesn't seem so far-fetched. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if our head coach would whole-heartedly support it.
I'll give you another example, I sat in the student section for the 2002 Georgia game and late in the game, we caused UGA to fumble and almost returned it for a touchdown in what would've put the game away. However, they were called for illegal formation that the line judge didn't blow dead before the snap, and we weren't given the opportunity to decline it. A couple plays later, they hit a big gainer that sets them up for the game-winning field goal. Basically, if their split-end would've not screwed up there, we would've most likely won a very evenly contested game. Now, if illegal formation is a dead-ball foul yet the play is run and followed without blowing the whistle... But that's not a fluke; it was just a rewarded mistake.
At the end of the day, I'm all about fixing as many problems as possible. And flukes are problems. Solutions should be in green font...
