NFL Reviews Replay Policy and Says Yes

The NFL, responding to a series of embarrassing officiating gaffes that stained the 1998 season, voted Wednesday to bring back instant replay for 1999.

By a margin of 28-3, the league voted to give coaches authority to challenge certain calls in all but the final two minutes of each half. Then a “replay assistant” watching from the press box can order review.

In all cases, the referee on the field, viewing a sideline monitor, will decide whether to uphold or reverse a ruling--a key difference from the prior incarnation of replay, which was in effect from 1986 through ’91 and relied on an official in the press box to review videotape and make the call. It was plagued with lengthy delays.

The issue of whether to revive replay had come up in each of the last two off-seasons. Proponents said TV technology could help rid the game of errors. Opponents said that what replay did best was make the games longer, not better.

Despite substantial support for replay, the votes--three-quarters of the league’s teams--simply weren’t there the last two years to bring it back. But vivid memories of last season, in which questionable calls helped determine the outcome of a string of games, turned the tide.

“The media, the fans, the players and the coaches wanted a replay system,” said Tampa Bay General Manager Rich McKay, whose team had been a longtime opponent of replay but voted for it Wednesday.

The new system works like this:

Each head coach is given two challenges a game.

He may challenge the same sort of plays that were previously covered: sideline, goal line, end line and catch-no catch. As before, judgment calls such as penalties will not be reviewed.

A coach will signal his intention to challenge a play by pressing a beeper. It remains unclear how the coach will carry the beeper--in his pocket, on his belt, perhaps on a specially designed wristwatch-like device. The beeper will buzz the referee. The NFL considered but rejected the notion of having a coach throw a flag or beanbag to attract the ref’s attention.

The referee will review the play on the sideline TV.

Each review is supposed to take no more than 90 seconds from the moment the referee “begins his review of the replay.”

A decision can be reversed only upon “indisputable visual evidence.”

Using a challenge costs a timeout--if the original call is upheld. A challenge that overturns a call does not cost a timeout.

During the final two minutes of each half, the rules change. The replay assistant, a retired NFL or college official sitting in the press box, decides whether to review a call. It makes no difference whether a team is out of challenges. There’s no limit on the number of reviews the replay assistant can initiate, and they’re not tied to timeouts.

The two-minute wrinkle is a concession to coaches who said they wanted to concentrate during a game’s critical moments on play-calling, not on “game-planning” issues such as trading a challenge for a timeout.

“I don’t want to have to sit there holding a buzzer in my pocket when that Hail Mary pass is going down in the end zone,” Pittsburgh Coach Bill Cowher said before the vote. “I think that’s why taking it away from us in the last few minutes [relieves] us of that concern.”

If a game goes into overtime, review is up to the replay assistant. There are no coaches’ challenges.

Mike Holmgren, Seattle’s new coach and general manager and co-chair--with McKay--of the league’s competition committee, which closely studied the replay issue, said Wednesday the new system is not intended for routine calls.

Instead, he said, the hope is that the new system--formally called “Referee Replay Review” but already informally dubbed “two by two”--will be used only for the “huge, huge game-changing error.”

The vote Wednesday authorized replay only for 1999. If it is to return for the 2000 season, the league will have to authorize it again next March.

Since 1991, seven teams consistently had been against reviving replay: Arizona, Buffalo, Chicago, Cincinnati, Kansas City, the New York Giants and Tampa Bay.

Two years ago, when replay needed 23 votes, the vote was 20-10. Dallas, the New York Jets and Oakland also voted no.

Last year, again needing 23, it was 21-9, Oakland again voted no. So did San Diego.

The magic number this year was 24, because of the addition of a 31st team, Cleveland, to the league.

The closed-door discussion that preceded Wednesday’s vote took only 40 minutes. Arizona, Cincinnati and the Jets cast the no votes.

The difference was last season’s memorable officiating goofs.

Two examples stand out:

On Dec. 6, Vinny Testaverde’s five-yard sneak on fourth down with 20 seconds to play gave the New York Jets a 32-31 victory over Seattle. Televised replays showed Testaverde was stopped a foot short of the goal line. The next day, several New York newspapers showed photos of Testaverde on the ground, shy of the end zone. “God’s a Jet Fan” screamed a headline in the New York Post.

On Jan. 3, with less than a minute to play in the San Francisco-Green Bay wild-card game, 49er receiver Jerry Rice fumbled after catching a six-yard pass from Steve Young; the Packers recovered. Officials, however, ruled that the ground caused the fumble, giving the ball back to San Francisco. Replays showed the ball was loose before Rice was down. The fumble set up one of the season’s most dramatic plays, a 25-yard pass with three seconds to go from Young to Terrell Owens that gave the 49ers a 30-27 victory.

The NFL is based in New York, so the glee in the local media after Testaverde’s gift touchdown embarrassed the league and helped set in motion the process to bring back replay. The Rice fumble provided added urgency because it highlighted the league’s biggest fear before a national television audience--that a playoff game or Super Bowl could turn on a blown call.

Despite all that and even with Wednesday’s vote, critics remain unmoved.

“The thing they’re trying to do is correct mistakes,” Cincinnati Coach Bruce Coslet said. “If there’s a mistake, why leave it to a coach to throw a flag or ring a buzzer? If there’s a mistake, correct it.”

He also said: “They’re opening a whole ‘nother can of worms, a layer of bureaucracy, that they can’t even begin to imagine the consequences of yet.”

Also clear Wednesday is that support for replay from some of the teams that had voted against it the last two years is shallow. Kansas City owner Lamar Hunt expressed concerns over delays on the field, intimating that expecting anything else is unrealistic.

“I’m not a replay fan,” Hunt said. “I think the game is a live game and it’s entertainment on the field. . . .

“If you could say, ‘We’re going to get everything right,’ that’s one thing. But to do it at the expense of long delays in the game, I think that’s wrong.”

In 1991, NFL spokesman Joe Browne said, there were 570 replay-related stoppages of play (which led to 90 reversals). “I don’t think anyone envisioned nor wants 570 stoppages of play,” and under the new system, he said, “No way we’re going to have 570. I don’t know what the over-under number is going to be, but it’s not going to be 570.”

Even if the new system leads to fewer and shorter stoppages of play, it’s already clear it can’t--and won’t--be perfect.

Consider, for instance, a play like the one involving Rice, a fumble in the middle of the field. Once the whistle blows the play is over--meaning it’s not reviewable. “Replay can’t fix that, never could,” league spokesman Greg Aiello said.

A former referee wondered about interpretation of the rules, using sideline calls as an example: “What will happen at some point in time is that they will get into some controversy over what is the sideline. If [a player] is ruled out of bounds but he doesn’t go out of bounds, is that the sideline? If he fumbles the ball three yards inside the line but it rolls out, can you rule on the fumble?

“Those are things they’re going to have to work out.”

Better than doing nothing, Denver Coach Mike Shanahan said.

“Is there a perfect scenario?” Shanahan asked, proceeding to answer the question this way: “If we can get it out there and people can see that we can help our game, then I’m all for it. And I think that’s what will happen.”

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