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THE BEGINNING OF INSTANT REPLAY.
Ever since the NFL adopted instant replay in 1986 the college football community, including administrators and coaches in the Big Ten, had asked the question: Could an NFL-style replay system help the college game? And each time the question was asked, the answer generally has been: "Yes, but...."
Costs and fairness were two important factors that limited serious discussion about implementation of college football replay. The NFL had spent millions of dollars in hardware, software and labor to institute replay at the professional level, revenue that is simply not available to all institutions playing college football. Outcomes aside, there were many purists who believed that technology should not interfere within the human element of competition: mistakes will continue to be made by coaches, players and officials, and are simply an intrinsic part of the game, they would say.
But in an era with so many games televised - the Big Ten Conference has had 88 percent or more of its intraconference games televised each of the last five seasons - and with mistakes and missed calls put under the microscope and scrutinized and replayed multiple times, there is now more incentive than ever to get the call right. If a television replay shows indisputable evidence that an official's call (or non-call) was in error, then there should be a mechanism in place to immediately correct the error.
PERSPECTIVE ON INSTANT REPLAY.
Following a pilot program study conducted during the 2003 season, the NCAA Football Rules Committee granted the Big Ten permission to experiment with instant replay on a one-year basis for all televised games at Conference stadiums in 2004. During the 2004 campaign, play was stopped in only 28 of 57 contests (49 percent) for a total of 43 stoppages and 21 overturned calls (49 percent of stoppages). These numbers compared favorably to the Big Ten's instant replay pilot program, as the data collected in 2003 showed that play would have been stopped in 31 of 68 games (46 percent) for a total of 45 stoppages and 23 overturned calls (51 percent of stoppages). In addition, the use of instant replay did not significantly affect game times. The length of the 57 games utilizing instant replay in 2004 was only three hours and 16 minutes, compared to three hours and 13 minutes in all 2003 contests. Less than one stoppage occurred per game in 2004, as the Big Ten's average length of review was only two minutes and 39 seconds, compared to the National Football League average of three minutes and 20 seconds for its instant replay system..
REPLAY IS NO PANACEA.
Instant replay is not intended to be an instant, infallible answer to correcting officiating mistakes. It is, however, an example of how technology can help officials make sure that mistakes made on the field are corrected in a timely manner..
THE GOAL OF INSTANT REPLAY.
Only specific plays are reviewable, and only those plays where the absolute standard of indisputable video evidence is met can a play be overturned. The replay system allows for specific types of officiating mistakes to be immediately reviewed and corrected once the standard of indisputable video evidence is met. The replay system will not guarantee that all officiating mistakes are identified and corrected .
E-mail: brothers@worstrefcalls.com
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