NFL Competition Committee will reconsider challenge rule - ESPN

I would hope so!! I thought the overriding intent was "Get the call right!!"

I guess there are loopholes in the rule. You have to ask "Mother may I?" first and then we get the call right.

Sometimes the cure is as bad as the disease, what with side-effects and unintended consequences and all.

I understand the reason for the exception after reading this, but it was obvious in the Lions Thanksgiving Day game that none of the attempts at circumventing the rule for delay or strategic gain was in play. A common sense application of the intent to get the call right should have been applied. As it was, a blatantly incorrect call was left to stand -- when replay was available that would have corrected -- and said incorrect call was allowed to change the eventual outcome of the game.

The refs had lost control of that game before hand any way. They acted like they couldn't wait to get to their candied yams. They picked a bad time to have a bad outcome, what with a national audience and all.

from ESPN.com
NFL Competition Committee will reconsider challenge rule - ESPN:

Dean Blandino, the NFL's director of instant replay, explained the review rule, which was instituted in 2011, during a recent appearance on NFL Network on the heels of Smith's challenge. Details of Blandino's explanation were reported by NFL.com.

"The rule was put in place really to prevent a team in a challenge situation from creating a delay," Blandino said, according to NFL.com. "They're thinking about challenging the play, they commit a foul, jump offside, false start, now they've given themselves more time to make that decision.

"So we tell our coaches, 'Don't throw the flag.' Our officials should get to the sideline, explain to them that the play is not challengeable, and then the replay official is looking at it and he will stop the game and look at it if he deems that it needs to be stopped."

The New York Times cited a specific example of a team purposely incurring a foul in a Giants-Redskins game in 2010. In essence, the Giants recovered a fumble but there was doubt as to whether the Redskins player had been down. While Washington comtemplated a challenge, an official spotted the ball and Redskins linebacker London Fletcher kicked it and was flagged for delay of game. During that course of time, Redskins coach Mike Shanahan challenged the ruling of a fumble.

According to The Times, the competition committee acknowledged the benefit of time a team could gain by committing a penalty in this scenario, so the rule was changed.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

'via Blog this'

Johnson to run Chicago’s pitching development | Baseball America

Vanderbilt's Derek Johnson taking over as Cubs' pitching coordinator.

Johnson to run Chicago's pitching development  

This is a good move for the Cubbies. A well respected, proven developer of young talent on the mound. Something the organization has been lacking for perhaps a decade or so at least.

One of the reasons Vanderbilt has recruited a solid run of pitchers that has aided their run to the upper echelon of college baseball. 

From College to the Pros One of college baseball's most respected and accomplished pitching coaches left for a job in professional ball. Vanderbilt associate head coach Derek Johnson accepted a job as the Cubs' minor league pitching coordinator.

Johnson, the 2010 Baseball America/ABCA Assistant Coach of the Year, deserves a great deal of credit for helping Tim Corbin build Vanderbilt into an elite program on the national level. Johnson joined the Vandy staff a year before Corbin was hired as head coach in 2002, and Corbin made the wise decision to keep him on board. In the last decade, Johnson has earned a glowing reputation among his peers and the scouting community for his ability to develop quality arms, including David Price, Mike Minor, Sonny Gray and Jeremy Sowers.

"He's had as much impact on our program as anyone," Corbin told BA in 2010. "I think what D.J. has done with these kids is far-reaching. He's kept them healthy, he's made each one of them better. You look at the kids, the pitchers specifically, that have come out of our program, being able to pitch at the next level—it goes without saying . . . We would not have our success without having him on our staff."

Johnson was widely regarded as a top up-and-coming head coach candidate, but head coaches have certain administrative responsibilities that did not appeal to Johnson, who simply loves to teach pitching. An Illinois native who grew up rooting for the Cubs, Johnson said he was eager to take on the challenge of making the transition to pro ball.

"Obviously, I didn't look at being a pitching coordinator as necessarily being my next step, but on the college side, I didn't love the idea of being a head baseball coach in college," Johnson said. "In terms of a progression and what was the next step for me, this makes sense . . . I met all of those guys (in the Chicago front office), and I really felt like it was a great situation and just felt very, very comfortable with them, trying to understand what their vision was for the Cubs. I felt like it was something I wanted to be a part of."

A Shared Vision

Johnson spent two days in Arizona with Cubs director of scouting and player development Jason McLeod and other club officials. During those discussions, the team and Johnson discovered they share certain beliefs.

"Most importantly, we felt like his intelligence and vision aligned with ours," McLeod said. "We got a lot of good feedback from guys that continue to work with him and have gone on to the pro level. You can tell he feels very strongly about his beliefs, but also is open to other information."

Johnson is a gifted teacher with a knack for adapting to the needs of his pitchers—he does not adhere to a one-size-fits-all philosophy. But he does believe in the benefits of long-tossing, so this hire could mark an organizational shift toward longer-throwing programs—though long-tossing isn't likely to become dogma.

"If anything, we're trying to explore all avenues to make our pitchers better. Just because D.J.'s on board doesn't mean all of a sudden the Cubs are a long-toss organization," McLeod said. "Even though he may be a proponent of it, he understands that guys are still individuals, and he'll impact pitchers on a case-by-case basis . . . He's coming in here to learn himself and instill a lot of the things that he believes in."

It goes without saying that Johnson leaves a gaping hole on the Vanderbilt coaching staff. But under Corbin, Vandy has proven it can attract the best and brightest assistants—it replaced former recruiting coordinator Erik Bakich with Arizona State's Josh Holliday, and it replaced Holliday this summer with another highly regarded Sun Devil, Travis Jewett. Vandebilt assistant positions are among the highest-paying in college baseball, and the job will be attractive for many of the same reasons playing for Vandy is attractive: the school, the campus, the city, the head coach and the resources.

"I think—and I'm biased, obviously—it's easily the best pitching job in the country, bar none, and there's not even one that's close," Johnson said. "So the appeal of it, even though the timing's not great, (Corbin) will have the pick of the litter."

Vanderbilt wound up hiring Scott Brown away from St. John's to replace Johnson.