Breaking Down the Controversial “No Catch” call | Baltimore Ravens Vs Pittsburgh Steelers

Breaking Down the Controversial “No Catch” call | Baltimore Ravens Vs Pittsburgh Steelers

Okay, we had a bit of controversy at the end of the Steelers Ravens game. In fact, John Harbaugh today said that the catch rule is about as clear as mud right now. That’s how I feel about it. We had a conversation with the league office and we appreciate that. It didn’t clear anything up. It didn’t make it any easier to understand. So, what’s what’s the deal with the catch rule? Why is there controversy? First, let’s talk about game situation and season situation. Both of these teams currently are in a dog fight for the division lead. They’re both sitting at six and six. So, the winner will take the lead in the division. Um, you you see that the Steelers find themselves up five points, but with the Ravens having the ball inside the 15 under three minutes. Prime opportunity to take the lead. Here is the play. I’ll show it maybe a couple times. You see Lamar Jackson hits Isaiah likely who has it for a second and then ultimately it gets jarred loose. Is this a catch? Is this an incomplete pass? What is the What is the the deal here? A tale as old as time? is the NFL having questionable catch rule stuff. Let’s get into it. So, this is, I think, the best angle to showcase uh what we’re going to talk about here. But first, let’s remind ourselves what the actual catch rule is. I’ll put it on the screen. This is the rule. Uh A and B we don’t have to talk about too much. Uh I think you get that. It’s essentially A is just you have possession. B is you either touch the ground with a body part or both feet. That is a catch. But there is a third part that you have to have to maintain the catch. Just having two feet down and having possession for 1 millisecond is not enough. It’s worth mentioning for C here, it has to be after both A and B have been fulfilled. You have to then clearly perform any act common to the game. And the examples given are extend the ball forward, take an additional step, tuck the ball and turn up field or ward off an opponent. Uh or he maintains control of the ball long enough to do so. So essentially, you either do one of those things or you just have the ball long enough. You clearly could have done one of those things if you wanted to. So, I’ll hit play here and you’re going to see that for Isaiah likely. So, okay, I paused it again. Um, this is after he makes the catch and both feet have touched the the ground. So, he’s in bounds. At this point, you just have to make a football move. Even if you go out of bounds and make the football move, it still is okay. You just have to have it for essentially enough time to do something with it is is the way the rule works. They don’t want uh fumbles to happen constantly. That is the explanation given. So, the question is, does Isaiah likely at this point forward do something that counts as a football move? A lot of people had said, well, he was kind of sticking his uh sticking the ball out, doesn’t that count? He was doing that prior prior to getting the second foot uh down. Remember, it has to be after the second foot is down that you stick the ball out. If that’s your football move, the ball is already stuck out. That is not it. The closest thing is going to be the third step. So, again, I will play it a second. And you see right here, the ball is loose. That third step has not hit the ground. So again, listen, this is really easy to tell when you have slow motion, and this is part of the issue with replay, which is something I’ve talked about a lot on this channel. But by rule, there is no controversy here. This is the correct call. This is the correct application of of the rules. And I’m not exactly sure what John Harbaugh is confused about because this is correct. I’ll show it a few more times just so you can see it, too. I guess the best argument against it could be like is it when the second uh foot is down, does he continue to extend and is that little bit of a continuation to extend? Is that a football move? I really don’t think so. I think they got this call right. I don’t know. Maybe I’m maybe I’m delusional, but uh that’s that’s the way I see it. Again, I know people will disagree and that’s okay, but I I always just give my opinions on here. I think this is totally the correct call uh by, you know, by the officials. Again, if you have an issue with the rule itself, you can have that issue. if you have an issue with free play getting implemented and stuff like this where you have to massively slow things down and go frame by frame to see if it’s a catch or not. I don’t disagree with that either. But by rule, this is a incomplete pass and I think that they got the call right and I think the Steelers would have been uh would have been jobbed had this been ruled a touchdown. That’s how I see it. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. Always love hearing from you.

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