By WFAN.com
NFL owners approved a major rule change Tuesday by making pass interference -- whether it was flagged or not -- subject to replay challenges.
While the change aims to prevent the sort of no-call that helped send the Rams to the Super Bowl instead of the Saints, it also raises plenty of other questions, WFAN's Boomer Esiason and Gregg Giannotti said Wednesday.
"I'm kind of in favor of this, but I'm really worried about the nuances of the rule and the way the rule is going to be looked at, and really how serious are they going to be, like if there's some hand-checking and stuff like that?" Esiason said on the "Boomer & Gio" show. "And who is going to decide whether or not it is going to be pass interference?
"The thing that I was hoping that was going to come out of what happened down in New Orleans in the NFC championship game was that they would've put targeting or defenseless receiver in the replay, where you either confirm it or you throw it (the flag) and you ask for it to be confirmed. Because I don't like those calls when they happen so fast. They do look like to the naked eye that there is helmet-to-helmet contact, and then how many times do we see the replay afterwards and there's no helmet-to-helmet contact and there's still the 15-yard penalty that is basically awarded to the offense? I was hoping that they would do that."
Giannotti said he likes that the rule change is only being implemented for one year to evaluate how it goes, but he wondered why other penalties aren't also reviewable.
"Bill Belichick has said for years, why don't you just review everything? Why are we just limiting the review?" he said. "And now that you've included penalties and things that they have said in the past have been judgment calls, now I'm in agreement with him. Because now you're telling me that a pass interference in that situation is more important than maybe another call that could give you a first down. Let's say, for example, there was an egregious defensive-holding call that happened to the Saints and it wasn't pass interference. This rule doesn't change that. So now it's just specific to one particular penalty, and I don't like that."
To listen to the full open from Wednesday's show, click on the audio player above.
