This past Tuesday, the NFL introduced a bevy of rule changes at the annual owner’s meetings. One of the most important includes the new rule that two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties in a game will now equate to an ejection. The rule is new to the NFL but not new to football, it has been the norm in college and in high school, with an added suspension for the subsequent game in many high school leagues. The problem with bringing it to the NFL is that way too many actions are considered unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. And also, much like the technical foul in the game of basketball, you will see more and more things added to an unwritten list of rules that refs will consider “unsportsmanlike.”
If you followed much of football last year you will know that the true motivation behind this new rule derived from one specific game, Carolina Panthers vs. the New York Giants in week 15. Much hype and added attention built up throughout the week leading up to that football Sunday. This came from the much-anticipated battle between Josh Norman, an up-and-coming cornerback, and Odell Beckham Jr., a big time receiver. Everyone, including myself, was looking forward to seeing who would get the best of who during that game and it ended up being the exact antithesis of what fans expected.
From the moment the game started, instead of actually playing football, Norman and Beckham went after each other. Play after play, there was extra contact between the two, shoving, pushing, throwing each other to the ground. And for the first couple of series, it was interesting to see, because who doesn’t like a chippy football game? After a while though, it became a little much, and you could see the frustration between the two had taken much attention away from the actual game.
It became even worse when Beckham was seen charging full force at Norman and they collided helmet to helmet. Ejections at this time were totally up to the discretion of the referees and neither of them were ejected. ESPN and NFL Network had a media field day with this incident, and many analysts took the opportunity to keep pushing the fact that the incident did not look good for the game of football.
Like the NFL organization does most times when they hear a public perception of themselves that doesn’t fit the one they want to portray, they create a public campaign to show the world of their change, and, at the end, it doesn’t really mean much. When the NFL suspended Ray Rice for two games after a domestic violence issue, they immediately heard a public outcry that it wasn’t a fitting punishment.
The NFL, in return, created a “policy” that suspended players six games without pay for domestic violence issues, as if there is a true timeline that justifies putting your hands on a woman. We see here, that two well-known NFL stars on television getting into a scuffle doesn’t create the right perception for the NFL, so they again create a policy, one that doesn’t solve the underlying problem, but only creates more issues.
There will never not be chippy games, or an occasional scuffle between teams or players. The game within itself is violent and intense, but at the same time the NFL wants to create a mild and apathetic happy medium? I don’t see that happening and frankly I don’t see the point. I truly understand the importance of control to prevent chaos, because obviously there are other ways to prevent players from having all out brawls on the field.
Little things like spiking the ball in the field of play or dancing too long after a touchdown can you get an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in the NFL. And, as referees gain more control, you will start to see them baiting players to portray behavior that will earn them unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. This can be achieved by players not following their orders, or talking back to them after a holding or pass interference call. More importantly, if the NFL loves its ratings, who’s going to want to watch a full game if their favorite player gets ejected after a dumb call? And this is where they start to create bigger problems for themselves as an organization.
At the end of the day, there are a lot of other things the NFL could be working on to make the game and the organization better and more enjoyable for viewers. What about the catch rule? What about the fact that there is only one female coach in the NFL? Why is the Rooney rule still a thing, when most organizations overlook it anyway? Even more importantly, why the hell do I have to watch so many commercials during football games? Other than the Super Bowl, they don’t matter! However, fortunately for us, all new rules and rule changes are tested for a year before they become permanent, so hopefully the NFL will see the error of their ways.
