Time to change the "incomplete pass" rules on clock stoppage. Should be like "out of bounds" where clock is started after the ball is set and marked ready.

Of course this would revert to full stoppage in the final two minutes of each half.

(10-12-2014 10:04 AM)QuestionSocratic Wrote:  Time to change the "incomplete pass" rules on clock stoppage. Should be like "out of bounds" where clock is started after the ball is set and marked ready.

Of course this would revert to full stoppage in the final two minutes of each half.

Nah...gives a chance to pee and get a beer....

No need to change the game. Change advertising. That's all.

Get rid of all the inter-quarter timeouts...replace them with "on screen" ads. Think World Cup.

Give a 5-minute break between the 1st and 2nd AND 3rd and 4th quarters. Give a 15-minute halftime (instead of 20). No commercials during team timeouts.

I woke up (here in Kenya) at 9am and watched PSU/Michigan (ugh) off the Big Ten Network 2 Go...in under 2 hours (commercial free). I don't know what the actual game time was...but usually they are about 3:15 these days.

Want to get more people in the stadiums...want more people to watch the whole game on TV? Finish most games in 2:30 instead of 3:15. You can still get your advertising money.

Only thing that needs to change is go to the NFL clock rules. No stopping the clock on first downs. That will shorten games by a good 20-30 minutes.

Before we can determine whether a game runs too long wouldn't help to establish what the ideal length of time is?

AState has played six games and the longest was 3:34 and that was a 21-14 one overtime win over Utah State. Shortest was 3:06 on Saturday a 52-10 cruise past Georgia State.

(10-12-2014 11:51 AM)allthatyoucantleavebehind Wrote:  No need to change the game. Change advertising. That's all.

Get rid of all the inter-quarter timeouts...replace them with "on screen" ads. Think World Cup.

Give a 5-minute break between the 1st and 2nd AND 3rd and 4th quarters. Give a 15-minute halftime (instead of 20). No commercials during team timeouts.

I woke up (here in Kenya) at 9am and watched PSU/Michigan (ugh) off the Big Ten Network 2 Go...in under 2 hours (commercial free). I don't know what the actual game time was...but usually they are about 3:15 these days.

Want to get more people in the stadiums...want more people to watch the whole game on TV? Finish most games in 2:30 instead of 3:15. You can still get your advertising money.

I don't think they have been at 3:15 for a long time. They were running about 3:30 a few years ago (thus the scheduled start times on Saturday of 12:00 and 3:30). But two changes have pushed many games to four hours. The first is the spread offense/up tempo trend, which is now nearly as prevalent as traditional offenses once were. The second is increased use of replay to confirm close calls. I'd like to blame TV for these, but in both cases networks can't cut away to commercial either after an incomplete pass or during a replay review.

That only leaves changing the clock rules as a solution, or just accepting the longer games as a new norm. I'm not sure how teams with spread offenses would want to accept a rules change that decreases the number of plays they can run, since one motivation for those hurryup offenses is to wear the other team down.

Of course, offensive trends come and go, and when the defenses catch up to them they go. So except for replay review rules, the problem may fix itself.

Ideal average time is 2 hours 40 minutes. Assuming most games finish plus/minus 20 minutes within the average, then the typical contest ( over 80% of games) will fall in the range of 2:20 to 3:00.

Now make it happen!

Just because pro games run a certain length doesn't mean college games should run the same duration. College games should be considerably shorter. The talent grade isn't even close, and the precision of the pros makes the duration more sufferable. College games...especially among the non-relevant programs...it's f'n torture (I'll go out there and say Army-Navy and the Bayou Classic are about as bad as it gets on the national level at times).

What's so infuriating about the college game is that it got longer despite changes made to supposedly "speed it up." Chain movement, faster movement by the refs overall between downs, and shortened halftime...nope. You still get games that can crawl over 4 hours. The advertising component...it's so horrendously bad. CBS coverage in particular is excruciating. Figures, since they f'd up the basketball tournament.

(10-12-2014 12:25 PM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  Only thing that needs to change is go to the NFL clock rules. No stopping the clock on first downs. That will shorten games by a good 20-30 minutes.

Outside of two minutes the clock only stops to move the chains. At best that would shave three to four minutes off an entire game.

That said, clock changes that result in less football played is not in the best interest of the public. Games are longer because there are on average 20 more snaps per game than there were ten years ago. That will significantly lengthen games. Games are longer because we are getting more content.

Quote:Time to change the "incomplete pass" rules on clock stoppage. Should be like "out of bounds" where clock is started after the ball is set and marked ready.

I don't agree. Why some rush to shorten it? They already did the out-of-bounds thing to make it so games would typically lean toward 3 hours and not so much 3.5 hours. You want them to lean toward 2 hours 45 minutes?

College games even with NFL rules would likely take longer because of the number of penalties.

I rarely sit around wishing I'd seen fewer plays for my money.

(10-12-2014 04:08 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  I rarely sit around wishing I'd seen fewer plays for my money.

That's what I'm thinking. They could move halftime back to 15 minutes, or push the TV timeouts back closer to 90 seconds as they are supposed to be (then again as colleges are being paid $20 million per team they lose the ability to complain about that) but I don't want less plays. I didn't like the original rule changes because it cut out like 10% of plays and gave us less football. Spread offense changed that to what we see today, but just pointing out.

(10-12-2014 04:01 PM)toddjnsn Wrote:  You want them to lean toward 2 hours 45 minutes?

Like high school football games? Heck yeah, I do.

I don't get the arguments about the style of play making the game longer. Are Oregon games that much longer than anyone else's? They're basically a high octane version of the old WAC/BYU teams who tossed the ball more plays than not. Those games weren't any or much longer than anything you saw being played in the major conferences. And Oregon runs ridiculous sets while speeding up the game (part of the style, keeping defenses guessing and on their feet).

I noticed some big issues in the college game whenever one of those Cam Newton-led Auburn games graced the tubes. Other than ridiculous over-advertising, the refs just didn't have any sort of control of the game. Big plays saw celebrations, getting the ball reset took what seemed like forever, and the whole thing just felt...scripted for television? It was hard to describe. "Caught up in the moment?" Maybe a better way of putting it. "Amateur?" Bingo.

Whenever you have that sort of lack of control, especially in a national game of importance...forget it. You're in for at least four hours of nonsense.

I'm compiling the data but my eyeball assessment comparing AState under Freeze, Harsin, and Malzahn is that Malzahn games probably averaged around 3:10 and will be the fastest of the three.


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(10-12-2014 04:08 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  I rarely sit around wishing I'd seen fewer plays for my money.

We also don't sit around wishing for more or longer commercial breaks.

ECU routinely plays 4 to 4 1/2 hour games. That's just too long.

Go to the NFL Time Rules...out of bounds plays/incompete passes the clock starts back up when the ball is place except the last 5 minutes of a half or game...the clock continues when a 1st Down is established...Half Time is 12 Minutes.

In this era people especially the younger generation does not want 3 and a half hour/4 hour games...

OK this is one place where AState is an outstanding example because we've had a different coach with a different philosophy each year.
I omitted our bowl games because each had an interim coach and bowls tend to dawdle.

2011 Hugh Freeze. Hugh used the screen and quick slant as long handoffs in his version of the spread.
Average game length 3 hours 19 minutes. AState averaged 76.4 plays per game opponents 71.5 Record was 10-2
Fastest game North Texas 2:46 Longest Memphis 3:50

2012 Gus Malzahn. Gus spread the field more with jet sweeps and reverses passes over the field but generally deeper than Freeze routes.
Average game length 3:09 AState averaged 73.6 plays opponents 71.75
Shortest game MTSU and South Alabama 2:52 Longest game 3:35 Oregon

2013 Bryan Harsin. Game plan first seven games was between the tackles rushing spreading the field vertically with deep routes. Final five games play calling went to a Malzahn holdover and was much more similar to 2012
Average game length 3:17 AState ran 73.5 plays and opponents 70.4 When Harsin was calling plays game length was 3:20 With Drinkwitz calling plays 3:14
Fastest game Memphis 2:49 (called by Harsin) Longest game Troy 3:59 (called by Harsin)

2014 Six games so far under Anderson. Spread offense more similar to Freeze.
Average length 3:22 AState average of 82.5 plays opponents 73.8
Fastest game Georgia State 3:06 (star RB back and at full speed) Longest game Utah State 3:34 (one overtime)

Offensive philosophy certainly has an impact. Arkansas using a between the tackles, spread the field vertically philosophy averages 3:23 per game but I think where the impact comes is how much time is used signaling plays and substituting players after each clock stoppage.

I think you could effectively speed up the game simply by changing the play clock from 40 to 35 and reducing it after stoppages from 25 to 20 or 22
The quickest way to stop extended celebrations after scores is to use the 40 second play clock rather than a ready for play signal and 25 second clock.
Media timeouts after a kickoff need to go away.
We survived many decades with a 15 minute halftime and 20 minute was permissible by agreement, generally done only for special halftime events like homecoming. We could pare to 18 minutes eliminating studio time without losing commercials.

I think I saw a graphic where 67 minutes of total time in a game is for comercials. That same article said the amount of time for actual plays was only 11 minutes. Which is a little misleading, because it does not count the time to line up for the plays or get up after plays.

But its simple. Instead of stopping play to show commercials. Run commercials while the game is going on. The average play is 3 to 15 seconds, then 40 seconds of non-action getting to the next play. I am sure they could come up with a plan.