By intheknow72
College football is upon us, and with it comes another round of rules changes by the NCAA. This year’s perversion of the perfect game is a new 40 second clock. Instead of a play clock set to 25 seconds and started on the referee’s signal, the clock will now start counting down immediately (from 40 seconds) when the ball becomes dead. That is supposed to add more “flow” and consistency to the game.

Alabama fans…Auburn fans (and I know you’re reading this because you’re Aubsessed with us)…for once I think we can all agree on something. Whoever “they” are, “they” need once and for all to stop tinkering with the rules of the greatest game ever played.

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Baseball, the sports worlds’ version of watching paint dry, is for some reason immune to such heresy. In fact, the game is regarded as sacred. While admittedly there isn’t a whole lot one can change about it, there is at least an applied reverence to baseball where people do the right thing and leave it alone.

But not college football. No sir.

Which is why in 2006 we had to endure a new “running clock” rule that abbreviated the game we wait all year to watch, reducing it on average by 15 minutes and 14 fewer plays per game. After that season, where late game comebacks were all but impossible (because of an increased difficulty to stop the flippin’ clock), the rules committee voted to go back to the old system. So we had a year of sanity in 2007, and the networks had to get over broadcasts lasting 3 1/2 hours. But oh, was it so brief. The latest rule change is simply a backdoor attempt to accomplish the same objective in 2006.

I do have to admit, there have been some good rules instituted through the years:
•Rubber covered balls were approved in 1956, but banned as late as 1993.
•A standard football shape and circumference in 1982.
•Legalization of face masks (sorry dentists) in 1951, but not made illegal to grab until 1957 (sorry chiropractors).
•Thanks to the HIV scare, bleeding players forced to leave the field of competition (1993).
•Roughing the passer added in 1914, but not made an automatic first down unitl 69 years later (1983).
•Kick-offs at the 40 yard line in 1925, then the 35 in 1986, now the 30.
•Overtime introduced to break ties (1996)…but what in the world took over 100 years to get to that point?

Then you have rules that seemingly try to talk out of both sides of “the game’s” mouth:
•Intentional grounding is illegal and a loss of down…unless you receive the snap and move about seven feet to your left or right, “breaking the tackle box”…but you CAN be inside the tackle box, take the snap, and throw the ball straight down and it’s okay. Can you imagine trying to come up with rules for your children like that?
•Instant replay was introduced, FINALLY letting us get it right so that the game is determined by the play of the athletes on the field and not the inability for middle-aged men to see action happening around them at 120 mph (sorry Freddie Kitchens to Curtis Brown in 1995, Bama’s first win in Jordan-Hare, and sorry Preston Gothard in 1982 when you beat Penn State but were robbed). But we don’t want to get it TOTALLY right, only making SOME plays eligible for review. You still can’t review pass interference. Really? One of the most damaging no calls or bad calls that can turn a game? (see consecutive Bama-LSU games in 2004 and 2005)

One good rule change this year is a clearer definition of the chop block; gee, I wonder who THAT rule was clarified for? And every opponent on Auburn’s schedule breathes a collective sigh of relief.

But overall, can we just circle the wagons and say enough is enough? Can you imagine your grandmother continuing to tinker with that perfect chocolate cake you came to love? And we’ve all seen that person who’s had one too many plastic surgeries. Please NCAA Rules Committee, leave our beloved game alone. There are enough freakshows out there already.

14 thoughts on “Can we just leave the rules alone?”

  1. Very good article Intheknow. I agree 1oo percent they should leave well enough alone. The only thing they should even try to change is the creampuffs on the schedule. I don’t think I can take anymore Bama vs Western Kentucky or Auburn vs Ball St. For big matchups I love to fire up the grill and make a day of it, for the puffys I just pop a pot pie in the microwave and be done with it.

  2. I will tell y’all what thsi really is all about. Creating more Advertising Time for the Television and Radio Networks. It’s all about the DAMN MONEY ! More Ads !
    I was just wondering if anybody out there are sick and tired of these shitty ads playing on WJOX that cater to people on their ass. Credit Cards – IRS troubles – Computers for $30 a week – Is there no end to this shit?

  3. intheknow, you bammers are a lot like alcoholics. Ya’ll constantly engage in and latch on to this self destructive behavior of endless excuse making, and ya’ll are too blinded by your own self pity to even recognize it. Do you realize you just cited two plays from 13 and 26 years ago respectively as excuses for losses? You’re still clutching on to that? We won’t even delve into the rules about the requirement of actual possesion of the football for Curtis Brown (heck, who cares? you’ve got a picture showing a football touching Brown’s hands with his arms outstretched and a foot inbounds. Let’s ignore that he didn’t pull the ball in and establish possession until he was out of bounds. Why do those silly coaches teach receivers to drag their feet, anyway?) Oh, and the 2004 LSU F-bomb game!! Yes, that call was a difference maker. Bama barely lost that game by a razor thin margin of 26-10. (oh, here’s where we inject the “momentum changer” bs, er excuse. yeah…because there’s no chance that Saban simply went conservative and coasted in the 4th quarter with a freakin’ 16 point lead. No doubt that Spencer Pennington would have lit up that pathetic LSU Saban coached defense for another 4 td’s had that call not been blown.) See, blown calls happen to every team. Sometimes they go your way, sometimes they don’t. Bammers don’t want to acknowledge any calls that are blown in their favor. They just want to whine about the ones they think are unfair. Keep that attitude up, bammers. Everyone else in the SEC loves it.

  4. Agree leave the rules alone. If the real goal is to speed up or shorten the game it’s simple, keep the guy in the red cap off the field.

  5. I’ve got a real neat plastic turd in a gift box that I got from Spencer’s. Julio will love it. Si Julio ?

  6. Pluto, that’s a very hypocritical statement coming from the voice box of the biggest excuse making fan base in all of college football. I remember hearing every excuse the human mind could think of in 1999 after Shaun Alexander lit you guys up in the second half. And to move forward in time, Kansas State (close win), South Florida, and MSU came and my ears couldn’t take any more excuses spat out by the barnzoe trash. I even watched the Iron Bowl in 2004 with my uncle’s family (who are mainly fans of Alabama Tech) and all I heard was how the refs were on our side, or late hits, cheap shots, bla. Then you guys prevail in the end, and all I heard was “Alabama cheated and Auburn (Alabama Tech) still won the game” and not in a joking, but serious tone. So always remember to think and reflect upon yourself before you speak.

  7. Julio, blinded by self pity? Nope. It’s all the hardware in our trophy case. Damn, I can’t see!!!

    But thank you for the dissertation you wrote, giving vivid minute by minute details of the plays I barely mentioned in passing, which were only a small point in an overarching article on something else.

    How could you be so on top of Bama football? Easy. A-U-B-S-E-S-S-I-O-N. See, I’ve finally figured you out.

    Like the guy who swears he’s not gay but has boy band posters all over his walls, you are a closet Alabama fan. You eat it. You sleep it. You get your rocks off to it. But you hate that it’s true.

    Come on out of the closet, Julio. It’s time to be strong and just do it. Put on your little Crimson pajamas and be who you want to be. You go, gurl!

  8. …and freakin genius, the only thing I give Julio on Father’s day is a whipping. Well, that’s every day. I got papers on him.

  9. ah yes, intheknow’s typical insult laden response littered with homophobic references and self awarding title of “owning me”, but totally devoid of any response to the litany of facts cited in my post. Hey intheknow, you want to whine to us about Joe Namath being robbed of a td in the Orange Bowl back in the 60’s, too? Quick, respond with something snappy about title papers or irong your shirt…that’ll mask the fact that you were whining like a little girl about a call from 26 freakin’ years ago.

  10. I’d rather talk about Auburn’s six game win streak than Spencer Pennington’s performance as a quarterback at Bama.

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