Since the NFL season is over, and the Super Bowl is almost upon us, I’d like to do my usual thing and list the rules changes I’d implement for next season, were I emperor of the league. They are, in no particular order:
- Preseason: Cut back to two preseason games. We don’t need four.
- Instant Replay: Rather than the current system of coaches challenges, and the on-field ref going under the hood, switch to a Big Ten or NHL-style replay system. Reviews would be called for by a reply official in the booth, and the review would happen either upstairs, or at a centralized league office. Reviews would be shortened to 60 seconds, just enough time to view each replay once. If it’s not immediately apparent that the call on the field was bad, that call stands. Coaches would retain one challenge per game. Any play would be reviewable, up to the point where the whistle blows.
- Defensive Pass Interference: Go to a two-tiered system for pass interference penalties, similar to what we have for facemask penalties. The “incidental” variety would be ten yards and an automatic first down, while the “flagrant” variety would be spot-of-the-foul. Pass interference penalties would be reviewable by instant replay.
- Offensive Pass Interference: Start calling it! Too many receivers are gaining an advantage by pushing off, and too many offenses are running picks.
- Roughing The Passer: I understand the importance of protecting quarterbacks, but this has gone too far. Keep calling blows to the head, inadvertent or not, but if a blitzer only takes one step between the release of the ball and the hit, it ought to be a clean hit.
- Icing The Kicker: On game-tying or game-winning field goal tries in the final minute of regulation or overtime, if the defensive team wishes to call a timeout to ice the kicker, they must announce their intention to do so to the officials before the play, and call the timeout as soon as the kicking team sets, or before the play clock goes below 5 seconds (whichever comes first). Waiting until just before the snap and then calling timeout would be a five yard delay of game penalty.
- Playoff Seeding: Seeding is determined based solely on your record. Winning your division guarantees you a playoff spot, but does not guarantee you a top four seed.
- Super Bowl: No more two-week delays between the Conference Championships and the Super Bowl. One week only. And let’s finally schedule an outdoor northern/bad weather Super Bowl. You could easily fill Soldier Field or Giants Stadium for that game, irrespective of the conditions.
- Pro Bowl: Just replace it with a skills competition. Nobody cares about the game, anyway.
- Kickoffs: No more taking a knee in the end zone on a kickoff. You’ve got to run it out. Also, if a kicker kicks the ball through the end zone on a kickoff, where the ball never hits in the field of play, it’s treated the same way as a kickoff out of bounds.
I’m sure I’ll think of more, but this is my initial list. Thoughts?
UPDATE: Added the kickoffs section. Also, some have suggested eliminating fair catches on punts, but I think that would invite too many injuries. I like hard hits as much as the next guy, but I don’t want people getting killed. 
January 29th, 2008
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Sports, NFL |
17 comments
This is disturbing:
About a fifth of Arkansas teachers teach straight evolution, while another 30 percent teach “something along those lines,” according to a survey by state education officials. The other 50 percent don’t teach it, either because of their own weaknesses or community opposition. About 10 percent teach straight creationism.
Emphasis mine. 10% of Arkansas teachers teach straight creationism. If this is science teachers (and I have emailed the reporter for clarification), then 10% of science teachers are deliberately teaching something that is not supported by even so much as an ounce of scientific evidence. they are betraying their professional responsibilities and imposing the religious beliefs of some parts of the community upon their students, either out of personal moral failing or becasue they are afraid for their jobs.
And fear for their jobs was very real:
As governor, Huckabee funded a creationist museum and loudly endorsed the teaching of “creation science.” While his political allies in the state legislature twice introduced bills to ban the teaching of evolution, Huckabee presided over a school system that earned a “D” in science education and an “F” in teaching evolution. Only about a fifth of the science teachers in Arkansas taught evolution, though it was part of the school science education guidelines.
… But Huckabee’s obvious sympathies, and the intransigence of Fundamentalist school board officials, led Arkansas science educators to self-censor. Administrators cautioned science educators against using the “e-word” in their encounters with schools and students. At the Arkansas Museum of Discovery, the traditional state science museum, for example, museum officials removed an evolution exhibit amid a whispering campaign about the ire of conservative powers.
… Plenty of Arkansas politicians endorse creationism. In 2001, conservative state Rep. Jim Holt introduced a bill that banned the imparting of “fraudulent or false information”—specifically, the age of the earth or the origins of life—in Arkansas schools, museums or other state-funded programs. It died in committee, but a few years later, Mark Martin introduced another bill, which was squashed for procedural reasons. Huckabee isn’t on record about either bill. Nor did he comment on the ruckus over the anti-evolution stickers that the Beebe, Arkansas School Board removed from its science textbook in 2005 under threat of a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union.
When people talk about doing away with tenure or making it easier to fire teachers without proving cause, remember that they are also, intentionally or not, arguing for allowing school administrators to fire teachers who stand up for science and against religious indoctrination in our schools.
And, no, teaching evolution is not imposing religious beliefs. Evolution has nothing to do with religion. It is a scientific pursuit and it is taught becasue it is what the overwhelming scientific evidence supports. Claiming that evolution is imposing religious beliefs is either the result of not understanding what the words “religion” or “science” mean or a deliberate lie.
January 29th, 2008
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Politics, Religion, Science |
74 comments
God, this irritates me to no end:
We are grateful that there has not been another attack on our soil since 9/11.
First, what about Anthrax? I distinctly remember the Anthrax attacks, and I distinctly remember the fear those attacks engendered, especially in the new people covering them. But for some reason, those attacks have gone down the memory hole, never, apparently, to be seen again.
But it also irritates me that Bush can talk about how we haven’t been attacked in the USA and not say one single solitary word about the bloodshed our allies have endured. Ask the people of Bali, of Madrid, or of London how well our tactics have been working. An attack on our allies has to be considered as big a failure as an attack on ourselves. They are fighting alongside us, and they beled and die just as surely as Americans do. I am getting tired of Americans forgetting that.
UPDATE: in another part of the speech, Bush does make a passing reference to the bombings. He doesn’t talk about them when he gushes about how wonderful his failed polices are, and he does imply that becasue the US has not been attacked then everything is right with his failed polices, but he does say a single, solitary word about them. I got that wrong, sorry. It still irritates me, though, that the lack of attack son the USA is held up as evidence of success when its not, not in any meaningful sense. We are supposed to be in this with ou allies, and attacks on them indicate a failure of the overall strategy.
January 29th, 2008
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General |
17 comments
