The Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones didn’t lobby hard to change the catch rule despite the events of the playoffs.
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After multiple controversies in the 2014 postseason, the catch rule was one of the hottest topics at last week’s NFL owner’s meetings in Phoenix.
Ultimately, the NFL just tweaked the language rather than overhaul what has become known as “the Calvin Johnson rule.” One a receiver would have to “make a football move,” now they have to “establish themselves as a runner.”
It would be understandable if Jerry Jones was upset with the vague wording after his Dallas Cowboys lost to the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Divisional Round, in part because of an overturned call against Dez Bryant.
Bryant caught the ball by just about anyone’s definition of the word, other than the NFL rulebook. However, Jones said he could he live with the current rule, according to a report from Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.
"“Well, obviously everybody that makes decisions on these rules know that the same thing could happen against them,” Jones said. “Everybody has to play offense and everybody has to catch the ball. And so it really is an attempt by very knowledgeable people, very focused people to try to come up with the most competitive way to make these calls and so there was no club bias when we were sitting there. Now, we had a little bias because we had visions of Super Bowl if we make that catch. But still, I’m totally satisfied that every rule we’ve got is an attempt to do the best job for competitiveness, which in turn does it for the fans.”"
Jones’ reasoning is sound: His team could easily benefit from such a call next time around and the call against Bryant was technically correct as defined with the rules. Still, the catch rule is frustrating to fans, players and owners around the league.
The NFL will continue to be scrutinized about the rule every time a controversial overturn occurs. The new language doesn’t really change much, so it may take more calls in the playoffs to seriously overhaul things.
Whatever happens, fans can only hope they don’t hear the phrase “completing the process” too often in the future.
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