You can see the "controversial" 2-point conversion play in the below post, so I'll just go straight into the prose. From Pro Football Talk, here is his nonsensical complaint starting with his quoting of the NFL's rule on the matter.
Here's the official explanation from outgoing NFL V.P. of officiating Mike Pereira (via NFL spokesman Greg Aiello): "By rule, when a receiver with possession of the ball is in the act of going to the ground and performs a second act by reaching out to break the plane, that completes the process of the catch and the ball is dead when it breaks the plane."Wait a minute? Can we go back here?
But that's not what the rule says. Here's the operative language: "If a player goes to the ground in the act of catching a pass (with or without contact by an opponent), he must maintain control of the ball after he touches the ground, whether in the field of play or the end zone. If he loses control of the ball, and the ball touches the ground before he regains control, the pass is incomplete. If he regains control prior to the ball touching the ground, the pass is complete."
Basically, Pereira is applying an interpretation based on the assumption that Moore, while falling, secured possession and pushed the ball deeper across the goal line, before losing possession.
Again, that's not what the rule says. It says that if the player is going to the ground in the act of catching a pass, he must maintain control after he touches the ground. Not during, but after. In other words, he must keep the ball until he comes to rest.
Moore didn't -- just like Louis Murphy didn't way back in Week One. In the Murphy case, the call on the field of a touchdown was overturned. In this case, the call on the field of an incomplete pass was overturned.
And that's the other problem we have with this one. Applying the "100 drunks in a bar" standard that prevented the officials from overturning two key rulings that fueled that Saints' game-winning drive during sudden-victory overtime in the NFC title game, the ruling of an incompletion never should have been overturned tonight.
The only good news here is that the presence of Colts president Bill Polian on the competition committee virtually ensures that the rule will be addressed in the offseason.
Mike Florio is criticizing the league for applying a liberal interpretation of an admittedly very vague rule, while liberally interpreting the rule himself under the guise of a strict interpretation. Incredible hypocrisy.
The rule just says that he must maintain possession after touching the ground. The strictest interpretation of that would be to say that the receiver only needs to have possession the point and moment his body contacts the ground, that of which Lance Moore did. The only timeframe the rule gives is the word "after he touches the ground". Not "after he touches the ground and has come to a complete stop" or not "after he touches the ground and his momentum has ceased". Just "after he touches the ground". Define the word after! Florio defines it as a "complete rest". The rule does not say "complete rest". Florio pulled that part out of his ass!
Now during the game, Phil Simms argued that because Moore had it, lost it, got it back across the goal line with possession, and then lost it, that it should count. While it may seem like a liberal interpretation at first, read the last 2 sentences again and you'll see that Simms was arguing the rule literally.
"If he loses control of the ball, and the ball touches the ground before he regains control, the pass is incomplete. If he regains control prior to the ball touching the ground, the pass is complete."
Did Moore not have it, lose it, and then have it? If you are going by the rule by the books, the point at which he regained the possession after he lost it, it is a complete pass. And where was the ball after at the point of Lance Moore regaining possession? Over the goal line.
Bottom line, it may be a vague rule that needs some re-wording this off-season, but for Mike Florio to use criticize a liberal interpretation by applying his own liberal disguised as a strict interpretation is hypocrisy, bullshit, and in fact, it is dumb. Mike Florio loves stirring the pot and he is doing it again, and making a complete ass out of himself in the process. As I just pointed out, if you go by that rule word for word in assessing it on this 2-point try, like Florio claims he is doing in his criticism, it's a good conversion!
Yet another reason Mike Florio sucks at life.
Florio is a complete jagoff. I can't stand his references to "PFT Planet", the same jokes that he makes repeatedly (often times referring to Seinfeld, a show I liked, that went off the air in '98), or the fact that he repeats the same crap when he learns something new (such as when he learned that a veteran who was cut was entitled to one year's salary once in his career, which he mentioned at the end of every post involving a veteran being cut for over a year). I admit, about 5 years ago, I liked his site. Now, he's a douchebag who wants to stand on a soapbox! He generally provides no insight anymore and just re-posts info he finds on other sites or posts things to stir up "PFT Planet".
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