Ron Rivera found a gray area in the pass interference challenge rule, and the Panthers paid the price



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Carolina Panthers team head coach Ron Rivera was thinking of using the new pass interference challenge to his advantage on Thursday night. In the end, he discovered one of the major shadows in the new NFL rule, according to which coaches can challenge interfered calls and past non-calls.

While it remained 2:19 to play in the fourth quarter defeat Thursday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Rivera challenged a pass interference that was not called in order to advance the Panthers' position on the field and win a first automatic try. Cam Newton threw an incomplete pass to Curtis Samuel in the back of the right side. The pass appeared when he had had the opportunity to be caught if he had not had contact with Samuel.

When Rivera challenged the call, the replay showed that Buccaneers defender Carlton Davis was hitting Samuel five meters from the line of scrimmage, which would result in an illegal contract penalty and a first automatic try . Newton still had the ball in his hands when the contract was passed. Rivera lost the pass interference challenge because there was technically no pass interference on the court. There were illegal contacts, but it was not the purpose of the pass interference challenge.

The NFL has a problem with its new rule.

"You can not dispute the unlawful contacts," Rivera said, explaining what the officials had provided after his defeat on Thursday night. "I said:" No, I was questioning the interferences of passes. "I thought that when the guy would ride him while the balloon was in the air, it would be interference from pass, even if contact had started while the ball was still in his hand. "

The result of the match showed that the NFL officials had missed the illegal contact, a penalty that was not called and cost Rivera extra time. The challenge of pass interference was aimed at coaches to challenge a pass interference decision, but illegal contacts should be considered as part of the review process. Carolina would have been rewarded with the first try and Rivera would not have had to pay a timeout.

The NFL still has a lot of problems to solve with the pass interference challenge. They can solve this problem immediately, because an illegal contact during a pass interference review will certainly be evoked in the future.

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