re: The corner end zone nullified TD

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The ball hit him in his chest. That catch couldn't been any easier.

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From what I remember the ball hit him in the chest, and he tried to secure it and got pushed. One foot landed in bounds, but the ball was not secured immediately and it appeared it was not secured when he fell and then came loose.

That’s what I remember. He never really secured control of the ball.

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2 feet down inbounds then 2 steps out of bounds then ball comes out. If that’s not a catch then the rule needs to be changed.

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This. If play is allowed to be continued after a receiver catches and possesses a pass in the end zone, then defenses should be allowed to knock the shite out of them in hopes of jarring the ball loose.

As it stands now, that would be ruled a touchdown and the defender who be flagged 15 yards for unsportsmanlike conduct.

It's one of the other, but you can't have it both ways.

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2 feet down inbounds then 2 steps out of bounds then ball comes out. If that’s not a catch then the rule needs to be changed.

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That did not happen on the play in question.

That doesn't absolve him of dropping two. The second drop he was wide open for an easy catch. Please sit his arse on the pine for the next game. That was worse than Emery's two fumbles a week ago. There has to be consequences for not catching those.

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The thing I cant justify is how is that not a catch when its a td if a runner leaps, extends the ball, hits the corner pylon then loses the ball out of bounds.

They dont have to maintain possession. Once the ball breaks the plane and is possessed, the play is over and its a td.

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A runner doesn’t have to “maintain” possession because he already has possession when he crosses the goal line.

A receiver catching a pass in the endzone has to establish possession. The rule says that if you start to fall before establishing possession, you have to maintain control of the ball all the way to the ground. It’s the same rule whether he’s in the endzone or on the 50 yard line.

The question in this case is whether the hit and subsequent fall happened during the catch or after the catch. That’s why the announcers were talking about an upright receiver. If he catches the ball (meaning fully established possession) while standing upright and then gets hit, it’s a touchdown. If he gets hit while still establishing possession he has to maintain control to the ground for it to be complete. The two steps don’t really matter because at that point he was already falling. What matters is whether it was a TD before the contact occurred.

One way to think about it is: if the exact same thing happened at the 50 yard line, in the middle of the field, would it have been an incomplete pass or a complete pass + fumble*? If it’s a complete pass + fumble in that scenario, it’s a TD in this one.

*I say fumble assuming the ground didn’t cause the ball to pop out. I don’t think that was the case but I might be wrong. If the ground caused the ball to pop out, then the analogy is “complete pass + down by contact” rather than fumble.

Personally I think it was close and could have been called either way on the field. And either way, I think the call stands on review. As someone else said - if that happened against us and got overturned on review, we would probably be livid. It is what it is.

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One way to think about it is: if the exact same thing happened at the 50 yard line, in the middle of the field

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Does not equate.

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Does not equate.

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Yes it does.

It’s the same analysis - it’s simply a question of whether the player was still “in the act of catching a pass” when he started going to the ground. If the answer is yes, it’s an incomplete pass. If the answer is no, it’s a complete pass. It doesn’t matter where you are on the field, the rule is the same.

The outcome of a complete pass is obviously different because once the pass is complete in the endzone, the player has possession, ball becomes dead, and it’s a TD.

By the way, I’m not saying it would have been incomplete at midfield. I think it’s realistically a 50/50 call either way. And I think the call on the field stands either way. But it seems like people are overthinking the fact that it happened in the endzone. That doesn’t matter until the pass is complete. Just like subsequent outcomes anywhere else on the field don’t matter until the pass is complete.