Report: Replay review of pass interference “almost certainly” out for 2020....

Report: Replay review of pass interference “almost certainly” out for 2020

[profootballtalk.nbcsports.com]

The NFL experimented with replay review of pass interference calls and non-calls in 2019. That experiment likely will be over.

According to Judy Battista of NFL Media, pass interference replay review “almost certainly will NOT be extended.”

That’s the current feeling as the Competition Committee discusses potential rule changes in advance of next month’s meeting, which will occur either in person or presumably by teleconference or video conference. Because it was adopted last year on a one-season basis, any continuation of replay review for pass interference calls or non-calls would need 24 votes in support of the measure.

That’s great news on the surface, because the NFL struggled throughout 2019 to get the standard right for overturning interference calls and non-calls. In the preseason, it seemed too high. Early in the regular season, it seemed too low. And it continued to move up and down throughout the year.

Still, the league will need to adopt something in order to avoid another Rams-Saints non-call debacle. Sky judge continues to be a possibility, although its parameters are unclear. If all else fails, NFL senior V.P. of officiating Al Riveron needs to be ready and willing to break the rules regarding use of the real-time communication pipeline to clean up what could become a gigantic mess.

Indeed, if Riveron had simply done that during the Rams-Saints game, instructing the on-field officials to drop a flag after Nickell Robey-Coleman blew up Tommylee Lewis, no one would have said anything about it — and the last 14 months wouldn’t have seen so much time devoted to preventing the problem from happening again.

That’s hardly an ideal approach (especially if the league won’t be bringing back Dean Blandino), but it’s better than nothing at all. We saw what can happens when there’s no glass to break in the event of a pass interference emergency.