HUGE MISTAKE BY ANNOUNCERS!!!!!!!!!!!!

CFL Talk
1

We were watching the game on TV, and one thing kept bothering us in the 2nd quarter. The TSN crew simply does not know the rules of the league. No one realized what a huge mistake the announcers kept on making.

The incident was when the Bombers were 3rd and 30, and need to get to approximately the 4 yard line for a first down. The Bombers sent a man onside to try and recover a kick. The announcers kept on saying that it doesn't matter which team recovered the ball, because it would be Eskimo ball anyway since the Bombers didn't get first down yardage. THIS IS SIMPLE WRONG!!!!!!!!!!! I've actually seen this situation come up before. As long as a kick crosses the line of scrimage, it is considered a change of possession and the first down yardage does not apply anymore. If an onside member of the kicking team recovers the ball, they retain possession, regardless of whether they had enough yardage for the original first down.

I quote from the CFL rulebook on CFL.ca

"Article 7: Recovery of Own Kick
The kicker or an onside player may recover the kick across the line of scrimmage, in which case the ensuing down shall be first down whether or not the original yardage has been gained.

Following such recovery by the kicker or an onside player, a player of the kicking team may interfere with an opponent provided that contact is made only above the waist of the opponent."

The link to the above can be found here:

http://www.cfl.ca/index.php?module=page&id=11

Did this bother anyone else? Because we were getting so mad at the announcers because they said about 8 times the WRONG thing. If Winnipeg had touched the ball last, even though they didn't have first down yardage, it would have been their ball since a change of possession happened when the kick crossed the line of scrimage. GET IT RIGHT GUYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2

Crazy forgot about that rule and alot of people on this board and others were criticizing Berry for challenging that. Really good thread and point. The TSN announcers dont know much about football if you already didnt realize that.

That was a great trick play and almost worked.

3

yeah, that's a bad call of misjudgement by the TSN guys, and RW, see, ABOVE THE WAIST! still think I don't know I'm talking about?

4

Pokeys, it was still a bad call on berry’s part, because the Bombers clearly didn’t have position of the ball.

5

…yes, I am still 100% sure you don’t know what you are talking about because you said no one was allowed to ‘tackle’ below the waist…the contact noted in this section of the rule book forbids ‘blocking’ below the waist…tackling and blocking are two very individually separate actions mr. smarty pants…

…interesting point though devestator, you learn something new each day…thanks for posting this…

6

...something kept 'twigging' in the memory banks when that play occured....that said to me....wait a minute ...this is a first down no matter where the ball went down field...... And as long as the guy who recovered it was on-side.. and it crossed the line of scrimmage...way-to-go devastator...you are absolutely right...and thanks for digging up the rules...the guys broadcasting the games better brush up on the rules.....i know i have to..good one :? :o

7

The announcers got this confused with the recovery of a blocked kick by the kicking team. In that case then the ball has to be recovered beyond the first down marker for it to be a first down for the kicking team.

8

Well I do not know about the announcers but those beer vendors at Commonwealth I think they cost the eskies the game! They need more training!

9

Yes I did hear them butcher the call, but later I also heard Chris and Suits apologizing for the mistake in the call.

10

Tackling, blocking, all the same ****!!! :cowboy:

11

Tackling and blocking are not the same, KK.....not even close.....

12

this is pretty good info…i would have never known this…thanks

and you dont think berry has learnt anything from the don? i think he has

13

no need to get nastily jm02, I’m just being sarcastic, god, I could say “I want you to cut off my arms and legs with a chain saw” and you would do it!

Then again, that wouldn’t be so bad because I would have a really cute nickname, “Torso Man” :lol:

14

Actually, they did acknowledge their mistake on air and quoted the rule. You must have been too busy yelling at them to hear them say that they made a mistake with the rule on that play.

15

lol actually I did not know they corrected themselves until today. The reason is we went to 7-11 at half time (Winnipeg is the slurpee capital of the world after all) and didn't get back until one minute was gone in the 2nd half. Luckily I had the game on tape, so I did see the correction later.

The problem I have however, even with the correction, is the announcers chastised coach Berry's decision to challenge the play for several minutes, and said the wrong rule about 8 times. When they corrected the rule, the correction lasted about 5 seconds, and they didn't even finish explaining it properly because they were interupted by a play and never got back to it. And this correction happened about ONE HOUR after they spent many minutes chastising Berry and telling everyone the incorrect rule.

To me it's kind of like when a newspaper runs a story on the front page that discredits someone, and that story turns out to be false. Then they run a two sentence correction a week later on page 13.

And what REALLY bothers me is that of the entire CFL on TSN crew, not a single person knew the correct rule. Now I know a lot of people might not know this rule, but these guys should, it is their job. They only made the correction because the CFL director of officiating called them to let them know of their mistake. I expect better from the people who broadcast the games.

16

Cut these guys some slack. They are not there because they know the rules. What they don't know, they make up. To 90% of the fans, they are the voice of God.

17

I've got another interesting rule interpretation that I was thinking about. I was just curious if anyone has ever seen a team try this...

Once upon a time, in 2003, the Bombers beat the Riders 29-27 in Winnipeg. Troy Westwood kicked a 55 yard field goal on the last play of the game to win it for the Bombers. I was at this game, and what was interesting was the Riders made no effort to block the kick, they had 4 guys in the end zone, including their kicker McCallum. They were only down by 1, and didn't want to give up a tying single. It seemed a little strange as if Westwood had missed a 55 yarder, it's only going to go a few yards into the end zone, and the Riders would have no trouble getting it out before the Bombers got all the way down the field. They didn't even try to rush the kicker as they wanted to make sure they didn't get a penalty for offsides which would move the kick closer.

Anyway after this game Dave Ritchie, in case he was ever in the Riders situation, took our tallest guy (in practice, not in an actual game) and lined him up under the goal posts and had him practice swatting down kicks beofre they reached the cross bar. If you swat it down like that, it would just be seen as an attempt to catch the kick, and it would not be a field goal. The ball would be loose though, and either team could legally recover it since it touched a member of the non-kicking team.

Now if he tried that, and his hand was behind the crossbar, so the kick had crossed the cross bar, and then was swatted out, it would be a field goal, since it had crossed the cross bar. If the ball touches the player trying to swat it down, and bounces off of him, and goes through the uprights, it would be a field goal, since it never touched the ground.

I was thinking about this because Calgary made a field goal last night after the ball bounced in off the uprights. The BC returner could have ran out of the end zone, jumped up and caught the ball on its way down, before it crossed the cross bar, and there would have been no field goal.

I was just curious if anyone has ever seen a team try anything like this in an actual game. I had never really heard of it until Ritchie did it in practice, and I have never seen a team try it in a game that I recall.