Week nine proved that the NFL has an intentional grounding problem. Up until this season, it was a fairly easy-to-understand infraction. You almost always knew it when you saw it. Nowadays, no one seems to know what makes this a penalty with refs flagging random incomplete passes.
That is, of course, when they get around to throwing a flag. Every intentional grounding call must now involve officials having a two-minute discussion about what just happened before sort of dropping it on the ground.
This week was only the tip of the iceberg. The NFL has an intentional grounding problem that’s spiraling out of control.
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The NFL has an intentional grounding problem: Exhibit A
In the Buffalo Bills eventual loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, quarterback Josh Allen threw a pass to Gabe Davis. Wires were crossed as the wide receiver cut off his route while Allen tossed the ball deep. This in no way looked like intentional grounding.
That didn’t stop the referees from flagging Buffalo for intentional grounding. It was a puzzling call that only noted NFL corporate shill Terry McAulay wanted to justify. Chris Collinsworth spoke passionately about the decision on the Sunday Night Football broadcast, saying there was no intent to throw the ball away.
Look, Collinsworth is wrong about many things when it comes to football, but he is spot on here. A miscommunication between a quarterback and wide receiver is not intentional grounding. There is no intent to ground the ball. More importantly, Allen isn’t trying to avoid a sack or gain an advantage in this situation.
However, this is far from the only example we’ve seen in recent times. I was at the Commanders at Eagles game in week four when Jalen Hurts and Philadelphia was penalized for this play.
In no way, shape or form is this intentional grounding. Hurts clearly thought A.J. Brown was going to sprint toward the end zone and threw the ball where he assumed the receiver would be. Of course, Brown had other plans and cut off his route. Where is the penalty here?
If Hurts was truly trying to throw this ball away to avoid a sack, he’s not going to loft it across the middle of the field where anyone could pick it off. This isn’t Nathan Peterman we’re talking about.
Everyone sees what is happening here apart from NFL officials who are doing the football equivalent of issuing citations for jaywalking. It may be following the letter of the law, but it isn’t in the spirit of the game.
The NFL has an intentional grounding problem: Exhibit B
There were two plays in the game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Miami Dolphins that were similar and yet judged entirely different. And, if I’m being honest, incorrectly.
In the first play, Mahomes spikes that ball in the ground to avoid a sack as well as the potential negative play completing the pass would bring. There is a receiver in the area and he’s under duress, however. Everything about the incompletion is intentional and yet, it doesn’t bring about a flag because of technicalities.
Fair enough, I can live with that. Assuming you aren’t going to flag a similar play by Tua Tagovailoa a few series later (Watch the video at the top of the article to see) where he’s clearly trying to complete this pass the Raheem Mostert. Being a left-handed quarterback under pressure and throwing across his body means his pass is errant. No, apparently, that wasn’t good enough for officials who decided this was somehow international grounding.
Either both of these plays are grounding, or neither is because there is not much of a difference between them unless you want to nitpick on the distance between the ball and receiver or the level of pressure. Even then, if you are judging on intent, Mahomes is trying not to complete his pass. Tua was wildly inaccurate. That’s not an act of intent.
This is the problem in a nutshell. Instead of pragmatically applying a rule that exists for a very good reason, the NFL has referees bureaucratically enforcing intentional grounding into being a major issue.
The solution simply involves a little common sense. If the quarterback is outside the tackle box and throws the ball beyond the line of scrimmage, it’s fair game. Inside the tackle box, the standard is simple. Is the quarterback trying to realistically complete a pass? Now there may be some grey areas, but much like porn, most folks probably know intentional grounding when they see it.
Stop overcomplicating this. Stop over-officiating this. Intentional grounding should not be a problem. Pass interference, sure, that’s difficult. But not intentional grounding. Fix it. And if the NFL doesn’t want to fix it, then at least have the decency to stop calling it intentional because in a lot of cases, the intent isn’t to ground.
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