Narrower goal posts and other possible rule changes

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Mara echoes possibility of narrower goal posts
Posted by Mike Florio on April 26, 2014

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Good kickers get paid as much as running backs. Eventually, the very best kickers could make a lot more.

In a recent interview with the team’s official website, Giants co-owner John Mara reiterated the possibility that the goal posts will at some point become narrower.

“You see a lot of discussion about the extra point and what we’re going to do with that, and I think there’s a general feeling that we need to do something there,” Mara said. “The kickers have gotten so good, there’s some discussion about whether we should make the goal posts, the uprights, narrower at some point in the future. We’re not ready to do that just yet but you could see that at some point in the future if the accuracy continues to improve.”

Currently, the NFL’s goal posts are 18 feet, six inches wide. The Arena Football League uses a nine-foot split.

Concerns about the easy of converting kicks primarily has centered on the extra point, which will move back to the 15 during the 2014 preseason on an experimental basis. Mara suggested that, instead of making the extra point harder, the league could decide to make the two-point attempt more enticing.

“That’s not out of the realm of possibility for some point in the future,” Mara said regarding the possibility of moving the PAT from the two to the one. “I think that would be something worth looking at.”

Competition Committee chair Rich McKay said last month that the goal posts eventually could be made more narrow.

The ultimate question is whether the NFL wants to make the game safer by removing an irrelevant play or whether the NFL wants to make an irrelevant play more relevant. At a time when the NFL may have to give the NFLPA a concession to secure an agreement to expand the playoffs from 12 to 14 teams, maybe the players will ask for the extra point to be scuttled.

And maybe the NFL would agree.

Giants president John Mara talks NFL Rules
Michael EisenSenior Writer/Editor @GiantsEisen Read Eisen's Mailbag

Giants president John Mara sat down with Giants.com's Michael Eisen to talk about new NFL rules and what the future might bring


East Rutherford, NJ - A significant change to the NFL instant replay system will likely be instituted in the future, but not in time for 2014 season.

Less certain is the addition of a playoff team in each conference, though John Mara said this week, “I think we’re heading in that direction.”

Mara, the Giants’ President and Chief Executive Officer, is a 14-year member of the NFL’s influential Competition Committee, which studies all aspects of the game and recommends rules and policy changes to NFL clubs. The committee meets for several days in Indianapolis and Naples, Fla. prior the NFL’s annual meetings, where the owners vote on numerous rule, bylaw and resolution changes.

Aside from Mara, the committee members include Chairman Rich McKay (the Atlanta Falcons’ President), as well as coaches Jeff Fisher of St. Louis, Marvin Lewis of Cincinnati and Mike Tomlin of Pittsburgh, general managers Rick Smith of Houston and Ozzie Newsome of Baltimore, and executives Stephen Jones of Dallas and Mark Murphy of Green Bay.

Many proposals brought forth by the committee were rejected by ownership or tabled to future meetings (the next one is in May). But some significant changes were passed and the groundwork was laid for important future modifications.

One of the changes that won’t be introduced this year but is possible for the future concerns instant replay. Since replay was revived in 1999 with coach’s challenges, referees have retreated to a covered monitor on the sideline, studied the play in question and made a final decision. Mara believes that routine will soon be history.

“I think we’re moving toward a system where replays are going to be conducted by the command center in New York,” he said. “I don’t think we’re there yet, but I see us moving in that direction.”

That shift will begin with the coming season.

“I think we’re going to experiment this year with communication between the command center and the referee,” Mara said. “I think there is a feeling on the part of some people that the referee still needs to be involved. Other people would argue that the system in college works quite well, the referee doesn’t have any involvement and that decision gets made upstairs. In the NHL, those decisions get made in their command center, the referee really isn’t involved in that. I can see us being in a position someday where our replay calls are done from the command center. We’re just not there yet.”

Mara said moving instant replay to the NFL office would benefit the game.

“I think you get more consistency, because you have the same two or three people making the calls all of the time,” he said. “I think in terms of interpretation and consistency, it would improve in that area and possibly it would be more efficient. You wouldn’t have to wait for the referee to run all the way over to the sideline and get under the hood and crank up the machine. You’d have the decisions made much faster. I think in college the decision gets made faster.

We originally had that system that they used in college back when replay was first introduced but we didn’t think that it worked well because the people that we had in the press box making the call were basically retired officials. We didn’t think we had enough capable people to have that system work very well, so we moved away from it and got back to just the referee making the call on the field. You still have up to 16 different referees working on any given weekend. That sometimes leads to calls that some people would view as being inconsistent and having inconsistent standards. If we can come up with a way to have it done in the command center, maybe it would lead to more consistency.”

Before the change can be implemented, one group must be convinced it’s for the best.

“For the most part, the referees want to be involved in the process,” Mara said. “They would like to be the ones that make the final call. Whether that makes it right or not, I don’t know, but that certainly has been their expressed preference.”

Another potential significant change is in the number of teams that make the playoffs. Since 1990, six teams from each conference have qualified for the postseason. The possibility of adding a seventh team has gained momentum and will be discussed again at the owners meeting next month. If Mara had his druthers, the system would remain unchanged.

“If it was strictly my vote, I would keep it the way it is, because I think it works very well,” he said. “I think the first weekend of the playoffs last year was as exciting a weekend of football as we’ve ever had. I don’t want to water it down too much. And I’m not crazy about adding games at night in January. It makes it tougher on your fans to go to night games in January as opposed to afternoon games.”

Although many commentators consider it a fait accompli that the postseason will be expanded, Mara isn’t so sure.

“I think we’re heading in that direction,” he said. “But I don’t think it’s a slam-dunk just yet, because it takes 24 votes to get that. I know there are some teams that are not in favor it, so who knows what will happen at some point in the future. It seems like we’re moving in that direction. (But) there still has not been a proposal put forth for the owners to vote on. Unless it happens at the May meeting, I would say that you won’t see an expanded playoffs in 2014 and possibly you’d see it in ’15.”

Mara discussed numerous other Competition Committee-related topics:

*One was the continuing debate about whether extra points and field goals should be more challenging. In 2013, NFL kickers made 99.6 percent of their extra point tries (missing just five all season) and a record 86.5 percent of field goal tries. In the first two preseason weeks this year, extra point kicks will be spotted at the 20-yard line instead of the two. That makes them the equivalent of a 38-yard field goal.

“I think something needs to be done,” Mara said of the extra points. “I think it’s become a non-event. You rarely see any of these blocked and maybe by moving the ball back further, you’d see more teams go for two, which I think is an exciting play. But we need to study it a little bit more and not rush into anything. You see a lot of discussion about the extra point and what we’re going to do with that, and I think there’s a general feeling that we need to do something there. The kickers have gotten so good, there’s some discussion about whether we should make the goal posts, the uprights, narrower at some point in the future. We’re not ready to do that just yet but you could see that at some point in the future if the accuracy continues to improve.”

Another possibility is moving the line of scrimmage on extra points up to the one-yard line, which would encourage teams to go for two points more frequently.

“There was some discussion about that,” Mara said. “That’s not out of the realm of possibility for some point in the future. I think that would be something worth looking at.”

*Sportsmanship issues dominated the committee discussions as player safety issues did in recent years.

“I think that players and teams have kind of adjusted to the safety rule changes,” Mara said. “This year, we spent just as much time looking at tape and discussing a lot of these issues as we always do, but I think there was more of an emphasis on sportsmanship. We were all alarmed by what seems to be a growing lack of respect among players on the field (and) that sometimes works its way into coaches and officials. We had one instance this year where an official was disciplined for allegedly making some inappropriate comments to a player. A number of us were alarmed at the number of taunting penalties that were called this year and the number that could have been called but were not.

“We just felt like it was necessary to make that a real point of emphasis this year. We got input from a lot of different people, from officials, from players, from coaches and I think people, for the most part, were generally supportive of trying to emphasize respect and try to eliminate patterns of behavior that we think are unacceptable.”

*New England proposed a rule change that would enable coaches to challenge any official’s decision, except scoring plays, which are automatically reviewed. It was voted down, but replay was expanded to include the recovery of a loose ball in the field of play. That was referred to as the NaVorro Bowman rule. After the San Francisco linebacker who recovered a fumble in the NFC Championship Game, the officials awarded possession to Seattle and the play was not reviewable. A similar play in 2014 will be.

“We believe replay is in a pretty good spot right now, although it seems like we keep adding every year to plays that are reviewable,” Mara said. “(In the NFC Championship Game) there was an obvious recovery, but it could not be reviewed. So that’s the one additional play that will be subject to review this year. But we don’t want to expand that too much. We don’t want to get to a situation where every single play is reviewable. (That) has some merit, but replay was created to review the big error, to get the big call correct, not to review every single play.”
 

Yamahopper

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Narrowing the goal post would be about the biggest dumbass move they could make.
Not only would it effect the outcome of games significantly in the last few minutes, it would change a coaches strategy from the opening kickoff.While there would be more going for it on 4th and 3 from the 30, a coach would more likely play the percentages and do a pooch punt to pin the other team inside the 5.
Lots of kickers would be out of a job and the new more accurate kickers will be making about 10 mil. a season.
This outta set the game back about 50 years.
 

Boffo97

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What we need is goalposts that move back and forth, making a narrower and wider goal alternatively, and have a mini-golf style windmill in front of them.

Also, there's a 1' by 1' square box that reads "Kick ball here to win game instantly."

I'm sure continually changing the game is a great idea and won't come back to bite the League.
 
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We should set up the "ROD dumb-ass rules committee" essentially if there is ever a slow news day there job is to come up with the most idiotic rules possible, things along the lines of moving the mock draft back 2 weeks. They can also be responsible for destroying any evidence of wrong doing by our favourite posters...oh wait the NFL are big on copyright, never mind.
 

moklerman

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I'm not sure why so many flip out whenever there's a rule change suggested. Some of them are indeed for the better. Not every, single thing about the NFL is perfect.
 

Boffo97

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I'm not sure why so many flip out whenever there's a rule change suggested. Some of them are indeed for the better. Not every, single thing about the NFL is perfect.
For me, it's the RATE at which things are being suggested. Sure, some changes to the game have been for the better. I remember when 2 point conversions were only a college thing, for example. But in the last few years, it seems every time you turn around, a new change is being proposed.

I'm just afraid that too much change could end up killing the golden goose that is the NFL's success right now.
 

moklerman

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For me, it's the RATE at which things are being suggested. Sure, some changes to the game have been for the better. I remember when 2 point conversions were only a college thing, for example. But in the last few years, it seems every time you turn around, a new change is being proposed.

I'm just afraid that too much change could end up killing the golden goose that is the NFL's success right now.
That's a fair point and I've wondered the same thing. But is standing still any more of an assurance against killing the golden goose?
 

Boffo97

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That's a fair point and I've wondered the same thing. But is standing still any more of an assurance against killing the golden goose?
Standing absolutely still when you need to move (like stuff to prevent concussions) is stupid too, I agree. But I think a lot of us would just like to see more a lot more caution from the League in making these changes.
 

brokeu91

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What we need is goalposts that move back and forth, making a narrower and wider goal alternatively, and have a mini-golf style windmill in front of them.

Also, there's a 1' by 1' square box that reads "Kick ball here to win game instantly."

I'm sure continually changing the game is a great idea and won't come back to bite the League.
:ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:

That is one of the funniest posts I've read in a while
 

V3

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For me, it's the RATE at which things are being suggested. Sure, some changes to the game have been for the better. I remember when 2 point conversions were only a college thing, for example. But in the last few years, it seems every time you turn around, a new change is being proposed.

I'm just afraid that too much change could end up killing the golden goose that is the NFL's success right now.

It could just be that they're being reported on more now. Media coverage has never been as prevalent as it is now. They may have been suggesting these kinds of rules for decades now and we only heard about the ones that actually got passed.
 

CGI_Ram

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Narrowing the goal posts is stupid. Think about how many games are kept alive by the threat of a last minute field goal.

Narrow the posts, you force the team to be more aggressive to get closer, and I'd argue fewer last second kicks... Both at half and to end the game.
 

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Might be worthwhile if they were able to adjust them by distance. For instance, make them narrower every 10 yds from the 40 on in. Would make things a little more interesting on shorter chip shot FGs.
 

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Might be worthwhile if the were able to adjust them by distance. For instance, make them narrower every 10 yds from the 40 on in. Would make things a little more interesting.
Make the field narrower too from the 50's out. Like a rhombus.

798px-Rhombus.png
 

CGI_Ram

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Here's one for ya Roger; have the kickers alternate between left and right foot kicks!

Dumb ass.
 

moklerman

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Narrowing the goal posts is stupid. Think about how many games are kept alive by the threat of a last minute field goal.

Narrow the posts, you force the team to be more aggressive to get closer, and I'd argue fewer last second kicks... Both at half and to end the game.
I don't think that would be a bad thing. The way the league is set up right now, anything more than 45 seconds is an excessive amount of time to receive the kickoff, drive down the field and kick a field goal.
 

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  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
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Here's one for ya Roger; have the kickers alternate between left and right foot kicks!

Dumb ass.

A combination IQ test/drug and alcohol screening for Commissar Goodell.
 

Boffo97

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Make the field narrower too from the 50's out. Like a rhombus.

798px-Rhombus.png
Ooh! Ooh! And you can actually have two games going at the same time on the same field! In one game, the green circle segments are the end zones, and in the other game, the yellow circle segments are the end zones! It'll be exciting because players can interfere with the other game!
 

The Rammer

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Let's just make the NFL the Arena Football League and we might as well unleash the " Golden Snitch" at the beginning of every game to right? Goddell you dipshit. That dude needs a good ass whoopin
 

RhodyRams

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if they going to change the rules then make 46+ yarders worth more than 3 points, and 25 and under only 2 points..between 26 and 45 will be your typical 3 pointer