

The league needs to figure out all these scenarios to avoid a nightmare like last year’s Tommylee Lewis no-call derailing a meaningful game, which eventually led the owners to allowing pass interference to be reviewable in the first place. If you apply a catch-all net of “any play in the last seven seconds of a one-possession game,” you’d also exclude higher percentage plays that begin closer to the line of scrimmage in the process.ĭoes a pass have to make it to the end zone to make the argument it is worthy of review? Is there a minimum spot the ball has to reach in order to be considered reviewable and not just a last-chance effort for coaches to extend a game they would have otherwise lost? Do you institute a sliding scale of how far a pass has to travel in the air to define a Hail Mary based on a quarterback’s arm strength or the height and reach of his receivers? Teams shouldn’t be bailed out on desperation plays with little chance of succeeding unless the interference is blatant enough for officials on the field to see - and as retired offensive lineman and SB Nation writer Geoff Schwartz says, it’s one of the few areas where defenses retain a bit of an advantage in a league that’s made passing easier and easier in recent years.īut how do you define that high-risk, high-reward play that can shift the fortunes of a game’s final seconds? These last gasps at the end zone are mostly the high-arcing passes Aaron Rodgers has turned into an art form, but there’s no set mold for the Hail Mary. What exactly constitutes a Hail Mary?Įxempting Hail Marys from pass interference reviews makes sense whether these are initiated from the booth or by a coach. Members of committee indicated they will likely have to define what a Hail Mary is and include that in the rule.- Judy Battista May 22, 2019 The league’s answer to this, presumptively, will be to exempt these plays from review.Īnd if NFL changes PI challenge rule, one issue is how they exempt Hail Marys from challenge - league does not want every Hail Mary challenged. The most obvious way to overthink this new reform is to point out how the jostling and jockeying for low-percentage, last-ditch Hail Mary passes could easily be flagged for pass interference upon replay. And because this is a league with a single-spaced, size 10 font, 89-page rule book, this will not be simple. Coaches will be reticent to risk a valuable timeout in a close contest without the obvious video evidence to make a game-altering change.īut it only takes one instance of a bent or broken rule to make the NFL look stupid. Any replay flag in the final two minutes would already be filtered by one set of officials or possibly two - the ones on the field and the ones in the replay booth if the committee keeps the booth review intact on top of the coaches’ challenge. It’s a small change that shouldn’t have much of an impact on the field. didn’t change the policy themselves, they effectively kicked it back to the rules committee for tweaking - likely giving coaches the unprecedented power to challenge interference calls and no-calls in the final two minutes of either half. And while Robert Kraft, Jerry Jones, et al. NFL owners gathered at their annual May to discuss rule changes and other proposals, with the complicated PI rule at the top of their to-do list. It lasted less than two months before getting its first adjustment. The NFL’s plan to make pass interference penalties (and non-penalties) reviewable by instant replay was voted into existence at a league meeting in March.

#Definition of hail mary football full#
I know full well that underbetting is less profitable in the long run, but 0.2 - 0.4 Kelly feels about right to me.Update: The NFL wisely decided (at least for 2019) that a Hail Mary won’t be treated any differently than other pass plays. You would have to have a dazzling run with a Hail Mary bankroll to go from 1.3 Kelly to 0.5 Kelly holding your bet ramp constant. My only problem with the Hail Mary bankroll is that the, say, 0.8 Kelly level you'll attain once you succeed is still too risky for my taste. To continue to place maximum bets at 1/50 of one's bankroll is suicidal.

Once the higher level of play is attained, the betting becomes more conservative. This is essentially for those who want to ascend to a higher level of play and are willing to risk being out of action should they tap out.

Starting with a 50-max-bet bankroll and catching some positive variance, you could soon be at an 80-max-bet bankroll as long as you don't re-size bets. I thought that the Hail Mary approach meant starting at some point above full Kelly, but not re-sizing your ramp upward as your bank grows.
