The new NFL controversy over the passage of the smuggler's rule, explained

It is not easy to register a bag in the NFL, and rushers who have managed to do so have struggled to avoid personal mistakes along the way.

Earlier in the off-season, the league added an article to its evaluation of passing rules that forbids defenders to land on a quarter. This is a hard-to-avoid violation and has created a storm of criticism from defenders and quarterbacks.

What is the new rule?

Here is the new aspect of the rule under the microscope, via Rule 12, Section 2, Section 9 of the NFL Rule Book:

It is forbidden for an urgent defender to commit such acts of intimidation and punishment as "stuffing" a smuggler into the ground or to fight him or to make him fall needlessly after the smuggler throws the ball, even if the latter has made contact with the smuggler. -step limitation provided for in (a) above. When attacking a smuggler in a helpless posture (for example, during or just after a pass), a defensive player must not throw it unnecessarily or violently or land on it with all or most of the defender's weight . Instead, the defensive player must strive to pack the smuggler with the defensive player's arms and not land on the smuggler with all or part of his weight.

In response to concerns about the application of the rule, the NFL Competition Committee met during a conference call after the third week, but announced "no change" to this rule. part of the rule. However, this has shed light on "the techniques constituting a fault".

Why is it controversial?

There are some important reasons why the rule has been widely criticized:

1. This is a difficult penalty for players to avoid, whatever their intention: The goal of a pass passer is to get to a quarter as fast as possible and to make it fall, so the landing is often – if not usually – more inevitable than an intentional act of injury. . It may be impossible to leave the quarter in the air.
2. The dismissal of quarterbacks becomes extremely difficult: Any contact with a quarter helmet is a penalty and hitting them under the waist is a penalty. Now, it is difficult for the fighters to hit a quarterback in the middle section without landing and win a penalty.
3. It has been applied inconsistently: As has been the case with other controversial NFL rules in the past, it is a difficult rule to apply by officials and every game can be interpreted differently. Packers linebacker Clay Matthews was penalized for touching shifts in three consecutive weeks, all of which were dubious calls. But Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, who seemed to qualify as a penalty for the passer has not been called.

What did the NFL say about this?

Publicly, the NFL explained its calls and tried to go ahead with its new rules, but the owners of the NFL Competition Committee teams were sufficiently concerned about in-camera discussions:

This meeting did not result in a big difference.

What did the players say?

Not surprisingly, many defenders have denounced the rule change. Here is a quick overview of the opinions of some defensive players:

But it's not just the defenders who are crazy – even the quarterbacks have been critical.

Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger said "I can not imagine that home fans are taking advantage of it too much." Deshaun Watson of the Texans said some of the calls were "just crazy" and "let's go to football". Aaron Rodgers said the rules headed in the wrong direction.

Other criticisms came after Dolphins defensive lineman William Hayes suffered a torn ACL because, according to the Dolphins, he was trying not to land on quarterback Raiders Derek Carr. A few days later, Carr said he preferred Hayes to land on him instead of being hurt.

What are the examples of punishment?

When the NFL announced Thursday that the rule would not be changed, it provided a video with examples of the rule in action:

The problem, however, is that it has avoided many of the controversial decisions of the first three weeks. Clay Matthews, the de facto face of unjustly treated smugglers, is not at all in the video.

This is the game that attracted Matthews in the second week:

And here is the piece that earned Matthews a penalty in Week 3:

The game that resulted in an ACL tear for Hayes, who claims he was trying to avoid landing on Carr, did not draw a flag, but the definition of the rule could certainly indicate:

It seems that the rule is here to stay – at least for the rest of the 2018 season. The question is whether the NFL Competition Committee has asked officials to recall the number of calls and if more changes are needed. significant contributions are made in 2019.