Sounds good on paper, but I’ve seen it called too inconsistently not to mention in many cases the contact was caused by the offensive player whom the rule is trying to protect.
My solution is to simply not call targeting on the field at all and have the official in the review booth send the film to the ACC office to review, then fine the school for any incidents of actual targeting.
(01-04-2020 12:27 PM)Garrettabc Wrote: Sounds good on paper, but I’ve seen it called too inconsistently not to mention in many cases the contact was caused by the offensive player whom the rule is trying to protect.
My solution is to simply not call targeting on the field at all and have the official in the review booth send the film to the ACC office to review, then fine the school for any incidents of actual targeting.
So just let the cheaters win as long as they are willing to pay the fines?
Dudes aren't thrown out unless and until the targeting call is confirmed on video. I have seen many overturned because of the example you gave of the offensive player initiating the contact.
(01-04-2020 03:28 PM)Garrettabc Wrote: I’ve seen just as many bogus targeting get players tossed.
I doubt that. There's no question that some calls are questionable. The point is officials are trained to err on the side of caution, and let video review decide the outcome.
If you would remove the penalty against the offending player, you may as well just do away with the rule entirely, and let players headhunt all they want. Because they will. Instead, if you really want to significantly reduce the number of serious head injuries, the penalties for upheld instances of targeting need to be increased. Ejection for a first offense, two games for a second offense by the same player, and the remainder of the season for a third. And suspended players' place on the roster can not be filled in their absence with players off the practice squad.
Until it starts to hurt the players in the pocketbook and the team in losses, behavior doesn't change.
(01-04-2020 07:12 PM)Garrettabc Wrote: Was head hunting ever a problem before?
You're kidding, right?
Apparently GBC was not alive to watch football in the 70's and 80's, He just need to look at Jack Tatum hit on Stingley in preseason
Cheap shot on Lynn Swann.
These hits happened in college football and safety never came into question until Mike Webster. Don't get me wrong, I love hard legal hits but leading with helmet and launching is for player safety and I rather err on player safety. Target is one of the few that it follows in the rules intentional or not, the call is made. Also, only penalty that I know can be called if the refs missed it.
You are all responding as if I just suggested that players should be able to take cheap shots without impunity. I was suggesting that the game speed is too fast for officials to correctly call it on the field, especially for the college refs who are much worse at their jobs than the pros. What works in the NFL does not necessarily work at the college level. If a Jack Tatum type of hit occurred in plain site, I’d hope the bum is tossed from the game. Most of the targeting calls I have seen was from incidental contact, certainly not worth having a player tossed from a game, and still others were BS calls.
