Pete Carroll Yearning For The Good Old Days

Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll has said he wants to go back to the days before NFL instant replay.

If instant replay will never go away, Pete Carroll would at least like to reduce it’s usage. A strange opinion to voice, as all the talk currently is about expanding instant replay, not reducing it.

However, Pete Carroll is oldschool. He yearns for the days when human error played a part in top level football.

Carroll made his suggestions to Peter King in his Football Morning in America column for this week. He was one of 25 people polled about what they’d like to change about football.

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“Get rid of — or at least decrease the use of — instant replay,” Carroll said.

“I get all the reasons why we have instant replay, and technology has opened up a new world for us to get to this point. But I miss the human element of trusting the officials to make the calls in the moment and then the rest of us having to live with what they called. It was both fun and frustrating, but I really liked the game better when the officials were just as much a part of the game as the players.”

However, former NFL vice president of officiating and FOX analyst Dean Blandino disagrees.

“I have come full circle on this since I worked in the league, but I now think coaches should be able to challenge anything they want. Don’t increase the number of challenges. Put the onus on the coach to save his challenges. This would simplify the rule because you wouldn’t have to wonder what’s reviewable and what isn’t.

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“Now that the league has added pass-interference to reviewable calls, we’re going to see the creep begin. Next year, they’ll add something else. By not opening it up to all things being reviewable, all we are doing is delaying the inevitable.”