Officiating across college football

My main issue isn't even the calls on the field, it's the review process. The amount of time it takes to review a play irritates the crap out of me.

Case in point; the End of the 1st half of the Auburn vs A&M game. Auburn kicks a field goal with about 7 seconds on the clock when the ball is snapped. The ball landed with 4 seconds, and the officials signaled it good at 3 seconds. The clock continued to run and hit 0. You could tell live that time should have been on the clock for a kickoff. One 10 second replay is all that it took to confirm that 3-4 seconds should have been on the clock. The ref shouldn't have to go to the headphones, they should be buzzed down and told what needs to happen.

That call should have taken 30 seconds to correct. Instead it took about 3-4 minutes, Auburn had to come back onto the field from the locker room, and the review still botched the call and added no time when it was painfully obvious it should have been.

It seems like every game there are straight forward calls that go under review and take minutes when they should take seconds. Have the refs wear an earpiece at all times, 1 review official should be onsite assisting. Get New York or Birmingham, or whoever out of it. Simplify the process and make it quicker. There's no way a game should take almost four and a half hours like ours did, especially when replays cost probably a good 20 minutes of that time.

bamanix said:

a lot of holding calls not made against miss off line. game has become to fast for the officials. I noticed a lot of lagging coverage as play was downfield. hard to make calls in pileups or goal line plays. will be better as season settles in.

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Officiating will get better with better Refs. That crew was terrible. 'Really, Really' terrible.

rgw said:

Also, I think that is basically what Saban is arguing for from a strictly competitive standpoint. He wants a commissioner with the mandate to have nearly unlimited discretion. Democracy is great but some things are better served for the ethical despot. The rules with ineligibles down field, correcting flaws in the clock rules, and demanding officiating control over pace of play v. offensive unit control over pace of play cannot happen within the NCAA committee structure. Sport is kinda best served by an executive and executive staff just dictating how its going to be with the ability for the owners (in this case the schools) to toss the executive if they don't like their direction anymore.

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Everyone wants a benevolent dictator but those are about as common as unicorns and hens teeth. Would never work in college football too many teams with varied interests.

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This is probably not the thread but I will make a brief comment because reading this got me to thinking about it.

Imo, if you step back and look at the quality of college football from a macro view the quality of the game has been allowed to slide in a major way. And i think our games with Ole Miss the last 3 years showcase that.

The rules of the game just aren't being enforced. Back in the day every drive was good for at least one holding call. Now you might go a whole game with no holding calls. HUNH offenses, illegal men downfield, targeting, pass interference, players dropping the ball before crossing the goal line, players hitting refs, refs simply not knowing the rules of the game, I could go on and on. I mean seriously how much are the caretakers of the game going to put up with?

To me it's turning like college basketball, where the NBA teams have complained for years they have to draft players who have such poor fundamentals and it has totally wrecked the quality of play at the professional level. You are now hearing the same sort of complaints from the NFL now. It's been tried and established that the NFL is not a viable league running spread and read option QBs. The QBs coming into the league don't even understand basics of playing the position. If it keeps going I think you might see the NFL start publicly calling out college football to fix itself.

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Probably won't help a bit to complain, but you can make a formal complaint about this past weeks officiating by mailing a letter to the address shown below...

Southeastern Conference
Attention: Steve Shaw
2201 Richard Arrington Jr. Blvd. North
Birmingham, AL 35203

The missed targeting foul from the hit on Hurts and the other penalty on the same play that clearly happened before the player for Ole Miss scored to me are clear examples that this crew needs to be disciplined in some way.

JDCrimson said:

This is probably not the thread but I will make a brief comment because reading this got me to thinking about it.

Imo, if you step back and look at the quality of college football from a macro view the quality of the game has been allowed to slide in a major way. And i think our games with Ole Miss the last 3 years showcase that.

The rules of the game just aren't being enforced. Back in the day every drive was good for at least one holding call. Now you might go a whole game with no holding calls. HUNH offenses, illegal men downfield, targeting, pass interference, players dropping the ball before crossing the goal line, players hitting refs, refs simply not knowing the rules of the game, I could go on and on. I mean seriously how much are the caretakers of the game going to put up with?

To me it's turning like college basketball, where the NBA teams have complained for years they have to draft players who have such poor fundamentals and it has totally wrecked the quality of play at the professional level. You are now hearing the same sort of complaints from the NFL now. It's been tried and established that the NFL is not a viable league running spread and read option QBs. The QBs coming into the league don't even understand basics of playing the position. If it keeps going I think you might see the NFL start publicly calling out college football to fix itself.

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If what you are saying is the pace is overwhelming the refs, I agree. You are spot on over the past few years with the HUNH. I personally believe these refs are so worn out that let things go.....like the ref staring down the Jalen hit without any obstruction. 10 yards behind them

Coach Saban attempted to address it to scorn. We had to change the players we recruit, but at least the D can sub last. If not, it would have turned into a fast break NFL basketball game.

The Refs were worn down before the Ole Miss D. Maybe we should cut them some slack and look at the root. Disorder. The thing I love about American Football is that it every play is a battle, but I never had a problem with gaps within the plays. We spent so much time on reviews.

JDCrimson said:

Everyone wants a benevolent dictator but those are about as common as unicorns and hens teeth. Would never work in college football too many teams with varied interests.

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The system I speak of works in the NFL.

TIDE-HSV said:

The blow to Hurts' head could have easily KOed him, Shaw's ridiculous "helmet to the chest" explanation to the contrary. If the DE'd laid JH out cold and grabbed the ball for a TD with Hurts lying back on the ground, would they still have ignored the targeting call? I say this because, sooner or later, we will see it, given current trends. To digress, a blow, even a heavy blow doesn't knock you out. May put you on the ground. I have
four ribs broken and displaced with one blow and I was still able to roll up and save myself in my kayak. IF the point of the idiot's boat had hit my helmet, where it was heading before I dodged, I probably wouldn't be typing this. This digression is just to demonstrate how much faith I've lost in Steve Shaw, whom I once thought would reform officiating, and the NCAA officials division. They will put out any fiction to protect the officials...

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Thanks for this.
I know I'll never get what I want, but at this point, I would like to sit Mr. Shaw down, show him the slow motion video and normal speed video from various angles and ask him to explain why this hit is okay, or, if it is not, why the system failed.
Jalen's head snapping to the rear before his upper torso starts moving in the same direction as his head proves that the initial contact was helmet to helmet. If that hit is okay, then the system for protecting player safety is worthless.

TIDE-HSV said:

The blow to Hurts' head could have easily KOed him, Shaw's ridiculous "helmet to the chest" explanation to the contrary. If the DE'd laid JH out cold and grabbed the ball for a TD with Hurts lying back on the ground, would they still have ignored the targeting call? I say this because, sooner or later, we will see it, given current trends. To digress, a blow, even a heavy blow doesn't knock you out. May put you on the ground. I have
four ribs broken and displaced with one blow and I was still able to roll up and save myself in my kayak. IF the point of the idiot's boat had hit my helmet, where it was heading before I dodged, I probably wouldn't be typing this. This digression is just to demonstrate how much faith I've lost in Steve Shaw, whom I once thought would reform officiating, and the NCAA officials division. They will put out any fiction to protect the officials...

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You have my attention. wow. I just did some alarming research on Shaw. I am behind the curve, but I take you word as gold.

As I said in an earlier post, this will probably fall on deaf ears, but this letter is going in the mail this morning. The more I go back and re-watch what happened on Saturday, I can't and won't sit back and be silent. I can't think of another time during a Bama game that I have been so infuriated with 2 blown calls, on the same play no less, that could have changed the outcome of the game!

Mr. Shaw,

The officiating from this past Saturday’s game between Alabama and Ole Miss left much to be desired to say the least. There were several calls that were questionable at best, but I won’t go in to those as many things go in to real-time judgment calls on the field. With that being said, there were two huge blown calls on the same play during this game that I and many others believe should warrant attention, discipline to the crew, and a review of the play review process.

The play in question occurred during the latter part of the 2nd quarter with approximately 3 minutes left on the clock. The Alabama QB #2 was obliterated on the play with what was clearly a lead by the helmet of the Ole Miss defender #10 to directly under the chin of the QB. Per the CBS announcers, this was discussed with a consensus being reached by league that the defender hit him in the chest. They obviously didn’t watch the same game and footage that I did. This should have been a targeting foul resulting in the player being ejected and a negation of the previous play. This should have been an open and shut case of the targeting rule that has been put in place to protect defenseless players.

Secondly, the Ole Miss player #9 who was correctly penalized for an unnecessary roughness call for a cheap shot hit on #34 for Alabama should have negated the touchdown as well. He clearly hit the player before the player scored, so this was clearly not an after the play foul as was called on the field.
Both of these incorrectly made calls could have negatively affected the outcome of the game, and these officials should be called out and face discipline for these blatantly missed calls during the game. Thank you for your review and prompt attention in this matter.

Sincerely,

I remember last year when Ole Miss got away with an illegal forward pass due to having offensive linemen downfield. After we raised a ruckus about it, the only team I remember seeing get flagged for it was us.

I hope our guys are really careful not to do anything remotely close to targetting, because it seems like complaining about officiating puts a big target on our back.

JDCrimson said:

This is probably not the thread but I will make a brief comment because reading this got me to thinking about it.

Imo, if you step back and look at the quality of college football from a macro view the quality of the game has been allowed to slide in a major way. And i think our games with Ole Miss the last 3 years showcase that.

The rules of the game just aren't being enforced. Back in the day every drive was good for at least one holding call. Now you might go a whole game with no holding calls. HUNH offenses, illegal men downfield, targeting, pass interference, players dropping the ball before crossing the goal line, players hitting refs, refs simply not knowing the rules of the game, I could go on and on. I mean seriously how much are the caretakers of the game going to put up with?

To me it's turning like college basketball, where the NBA teams have complained for years they have to draft players who have such poor fundamentals and it has totally wrecked the quality of play at the professional level. You are now hearing the same sort of complaints from the NFL now. It's been tried and established that the NFL is not a viable league running spread and read option QBs. The QBs coming into the league don't even understand basics of playing the position. If it keeps going I think you might see the NFL start publicly calling out college football to fix itself.

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To be completely honest, I could give a rip about the NFL. The only thing that concerns me is the quality and integrity or the college game. You make several good points, I just don't care how any of it effects the pros. Any changes should be for the betterment of college call. Period.

TIDE-HSV said:

I edited my post to indicate clearly that I meant a heavy blow to the chest won't knock you out. I guess I should shade that slightly, because a boxing blow to the solar plexus clearly can. However, that would be just about impossible in football...

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I was going to say, while the pads should protect it, a hard enough blow to the sternum can kill a man. A blow like launching full speed with the crown of the helmet.


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Tidewater said:

Thanks for this.
I know I'll never get what I want, but at this point, I would like to sit Mr. Shaw down, show him the slow motion video and normal speed video from various angles and ask him to explain why this hit is okay, or, if it is not, why the system failed.
Jalen's head snapping to the rear before his upper torso starts moving in the same direction as his head proves that the initial contact was helmet to helmet. If that hit is okay, then the system for protecting player safety is worthless.

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Here is a article and slow motion video of the hit on Saturday Down South. So at least someone is writing about it. I am not surprised that the Birmingham papers are going write anything negative about the SEC. Scoll now to number 8.http://www.saturdaydownsouth.com/se...i-am-absolutely-overreacting-to-after-week-3/

TIDE-HSV said:

This digression is just to demonstrate how much faith I've lost in Steve Shaw, whom I once thought would reform officiating, and the NCAA officials division. They will put out any fiction to protect the officials...

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I did lose some faith is Steve Shaw - but I think every head ump has a bad game and it just sucks that it was one of ours. I still think he's one of the better refs around. I'm sure it goes without saying that these guys have a difficult task and the fact that it is not professionalized only makes the curve more daunting. As long as they keep trying to adapt. I think the review aspect has gone a little far. Now anytime there is a pivotal play of any sort it feels like it takes an eternity to verify what everyone witnessed properly the first time with the naked eye ... but then again you have an incident like Jalen'***** which seemed to clearly be targeting (Just re-watched the slow-mo closeup and the crown of the defenders helmet absolutely makes contact with the right side of Jalen's helmet before the chest - and not in a way that is only exacerbated by slow-motion) and even after review it still isn't correct. So it's kind of a mess.

TIDE-HSV said:

I'm looking at the slomo, and what I'm seeing is the crown of the helmet hitting the bottom of Hurts' helmet...

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If his helmet had hit his chest as the SEC officals stated his head would have moved forward, but you can see it clearly goes backward as the result of helmet to helmet. Does not the university submit questionable plays to the SEC office after each game? I wonder if we will hear anything out of those hallowed chambers.