One of the crucial plays in Sunday's Texans-Colts game has been the subject of fierce debate among Texans fans who are convinced that it was ruled incorrectly.
But the NFL's head of officiating, Mike Pereira, says the play -- a Ryan Moats fumble that became a touchback -- was ruled correctly, based on the available visual evidence.
The fumble came when Moats was tackled near the sideline at the 1-yard line. He was initially ruled down, but after having time at the two-minute warning to review the play, the Colts challenged the call, saying Moats had fumbled.
Replays clearly showed that Moats had fumbled, so the ruling on the field was wrong. But several questions remained.
The biggest question that has Texans fans riled up is whether the ball was touched by a player, either Moats or Colts defensive back Antoine Bethea, who was out of bounds before it was recovered. If so, it would be the Texans' ball.
But Pereira said there's simply no replay angle that conclusively shows whether the ball was touching an out of bounds player.
"We could never find a shot that showed the ball touched out of bounds," Pereira said on NFL Network's Total Access. "We could never find a shot that showed on TV that it touched one of the players while they were out of bounds."
The question then became whether Colts defensive back Jerraud Powers touched the ball before he had re-established himself back in bounds, and Pereira said that question was answered correctly: The ball was on the goal line and was touched by Powers before Powers re-established himself, so it became a touchback.
The complex ruling is unlikely to satisfy Texans fans. But Pereira insists that it was correct.
NFL defends call on Moats fumble
Posted by Michael David Smith on November 11, 2009 7:59 PM ET
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21 Comments 
Latest stories in: Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Latest News and Rumors, NFL Mobile Exclusives - Rumors, Top Stories
Latest stories in: Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Latest News and Rumors, NFL Mobile Exclusives - Rumors, Top Stories
Pereira is wrong. It was a fumble but the defender never established himself in the field of play long enough. A split second is not good enough. Thats like a receiver catching a ball....getting 2 feet down...and as he is tackled, he loses the ball right before hitting the ground. Incomplete pass and the call should have been Texans ball on the 2.
I watched the explanation on NFLN and thought the question that needed to be asked was:
If you need indisputable visual evidence to overturn a call on the field, where was that when it came to whether the newly-ruled fumble had touched either Moats or Bethea when they were out of bounds?
This seems to be a loophole in the rule as replay is being used with supposition if a fumble is incorrectly ruled down by contact.
I would think that the ruling should have been:
The play originally called down by contact was indeed a fumble. However, due to a lack of conclusive evidence that the ball remained in the field of play, it is being ruled down at the 1, with the Texans retaining possession.
How were the Colts allowed to call a challenge after the two minute warning?
That definitely doesn't seem right. Even if the clock hadn't started yet to get "inside the two minutes", being able to call one during that long time out clearly gives a huge advantage.
StatAddict if you watched the NFL network replay of the game, they did have an angle where you could see that the ball never went out of bounds. I think the replay call was correct. The only question I had about it was, if the fumble and the change of possession happened with 2:26 left on the clock. Why didnt they put the 26 seconds back on the clock?
Stataddict has it right. It seemed pretty clear that Moats was touching it while laying on top of the colt defender. That was the ruling by the ref after replay.
Not surprising. Until the Texans have an elite QB or win a bunch they wont get the favorable calls and different treatment by the league that the Steelers, Patriots and Colts get.
Alan from Examiner.com had it dead on.
As does Stataddict.
This is the same guy who defended the "illegal block" call on Hasselbeck in SB XL.
Regardless of the peculiarities of this particular call, I think the rule itself is silly. If a ball is fumbled at the 1 yard line, and then rolls out of bounds in front of the pylon, then the ball is placed at the spot of the fumble (at the 1). If instead, the ball rolls six inches over and rolls behind the pylon and goes out of bounds in the end zone, then the other team gets the ball. Ridiculous. It should be spotted at the 1, with the offense maintaining possession, just like the first scenario.
They were so focused on the weirdness of the bounce of the ball and Powers hopping back in and touching it as it was laying on the goal line (correctly ruled the touchback), that they passed right over what happened to the ball as it was coming out (contact with Bethea's arm as Bethea's right leg and elbow were on the white at the 2).
StatAddict gets it.
He admits they have no conclusive evidence to change the call to a touchback....so WHY MAKE IT A TOUCHBACK? Leave the call the way it was on the field, or call it a fumble and give them back the possession. Don't change the possession AND field possession based on a hunch.
Stand by your men!!!
SO NOW ITS PART ON A PLAY THAT MUST BE INDISPUTABLE?
Absolute BS!
Indy's get the breaks because they whine. When their receivers couldn't get open they complained to the league. All of a sudden the 5 yard rule is strictly enforced (for some teams). Then they gripped about contact to quarterback. Payton gets a rule restricting contact. Phantom calls get them to a Superbowl because they want a new stadium. Isn't it wonderful when you have one of the Golden Children of the league. If Unitas had the same rules and the ref's watching out for him, Manning would still be looking up at his stats.
Good, tough call on the replay. But this is the second time that this referee and his replay official failed to confirm basic information: spot, down, distance, time remaining:
http://www.footballzebras.com/2009/11/11/590
Correct me if I'm wrong...but let me get this straight (and note: I'm a Broncos fan). The call on the field was that the ball was out of bounds on the 1 yard line. They replay it, and there's INCONCLUSIVE EVIDENCE on whether one of the players was out of bounds when they touched the ball. So the refs just glossed over that issue, moving on to the question of whether Powers touched the ball in bounds? That's just wrong -- if the first "touch" or "non-touch" of the ball out of bounds is inconclusive, the play MUST stand as called. You can't just skip over that fact.
Many, many Colts haters.
Moats fumbled 2 yards away from the sideline. This fact alone should make Texans fans shut up.
If it's not enough, than what if a decent ref calls offensive holding, every time the LT holds Freeney. Texans would have got at least 15 of these.
@ CAPTIVE. Your right! Those 3 teams are always getting calls going their way. It reminds me of the NBA and the way they treat their star players with no-calls on fouls. The NFL and their Officials intentionaly "mold" the outcome of games through bad officiating. Is it bad or is it intentional?
And all this could be a non issue if the Texans had just snapped the ball. What kind of a moron QB has a close play happen like that, gets his entire team set, then lets the last 8 seconds or so tick off the clock so they can get the 2 minute warning? After a play that pivotal in a game that close, he should have been scrambling his guys to the line and snapped the ball. Heck, just run a sneak if you have to, but don't give the other guys 3 minutes up in the booth to analyze the play and call for a challenge.
@Tyler
Right back at you, if the ref's called holding (which most would argue they could call it every play) when players hold Mario the colts would have been called 15 times.
Freeney is good, but so is Duane Brown, a second year player held his own against Freeney. His first sack was Schaub's fault for holding on to the ball to long.
Pereira is a meatball. He's turning into Bud Selig. It's frustrating when there's replay and they still can't get it right. Here's a pic from the AP that shows the ball loose and touching Bethea when he's out of bounds.
http://tinyurl.com/yerl7jr
The ref's call on the field was the Texans had the ball. In order to reverse the call, there had to be indisputable evidence of each of the following:
1. Moats fumbled the ball before going out of bounds. I agree the replay indisputably shows this. But that's not the end of the story. The call on the field was that the Texans had possession. In order to establish that the Colts should gain possession, more is needed. To wit,
2. The Colt tackler was not touching the loose ball while any part of himself was out of bounds. If any part of him was out of bounds when he touched the loose ball, the play is immediately over and the Texans keep the ball because the Colts did not gain possession of it prior to being out of bounds. This is where Pereira runs completely off the rails. He said there was no conclusive evidence that the tackler was out of bounds when he touched the ball, but that's not the question. Because the call was "Texan football", there had to be indisputable evidence that the tackler WAS NOT out of bounds when he touched the ball. There is no way the replays could be said to establish, indisputably, that the tackler was completely in bounds when he touched the loose football.
3. That the Colt who subsequently recovered the ball was established in bounds. I think the replay shows that he was (though it may be a closer call than #1), but this shouldn't matter in light of #2.
If the refs did the replay correctly, this should have been their official explanation:
"After further review, the ball-carrier did fumble before going out-of-bounds. However, the loose football was touched by the tackling player, and there is no indisputable evidence that the player was in bounds at the time he touched the ball. Therefore, the ball is spotted at the point where the tackling defender touched the ball, and the offense retains possession."