Jerrell Jackson's Block: Completely Legal
by Bill C. on Sep 20, 2010 7:31 AM CDT
in Mizzou Football 2010
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PrintThose of you out there who read Wiz of Odds on a regular basis (and I assume that's a lot of you -- few sites give you more quality links than The Wiz) may have already seen this fun post this morning, asserting that Jerrell Jackson got away with a block in the back on T.J. Moe's touchdown.
Missouri got away with one in its 27-24 victory over San Diego State. Watch the third play in this highlight package and you'll see the Tigers' game-winning 68-yard touchdown pass from Blaine Gabbert to T.J. Moe with 51 seconds remaining. You'll also see Missouri's Jerrell Jackson with a block in the back on San Diego State's Jose Perez near midfield.
The block sends Perez flying into linebacker Miles Burris, who was in pursuit of Moe. With both Aztecs taken out of the play, Moe has a free run to the end zone.
"They won the game so they must have deserved it, but I don't know if we had the full complement of officials," Aztec coach Brady Hoke said. "There weren't on that last play."
Hoke didn't want to make a big deal of the play, but was clearly irked by the non-call.
"I'm sure we got some [calls] and they got some," Hoke said. "But when that's the guy [the official] is supposed to be watching, I'd be watching him."
Not going to lie: part of me was wondering how legal Jackson's block was from the start. He's on the screen for approximately 0.5 seconds, so it's hard to tell what happened. With that being the case, here were my two reactions, in order:
1. "So what? Ronnie Hillman's 93-yarder was technically illegal too (linemen aren't allowed to grab and sling ball carriers), so the two plays cancel each other out, and Mizzou still wins." (As you see in the Wiz thread, I left a comment saying almost exactly that.)
2. "Actually, I have Photoshop and can blow up YouTube to full screen. Let's investigate."
Upon further review ... the block was completely and totally legal.
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This is one of those...
When I saw it live it looked really bad and then I saw the replay and realized…hmmm maybe the ref standing 10 feet away actually had a better view of the play than I did from across the field (or my living room) type plays.
Annoying You Since 1986
You forgot one frame
Tommy Saunders’s jaw drops open and eyes bug out in delight.
by MU'97 on Sep 20, 2010 7:59 AM CDT reply actions 1 recs
Even though JJ's block was on the screen for .5 seconds,
I was able to tell that the initial block contact was on the defender’s right shoulder not the back. I watched that play over and over again and each time was convinced that the block was legal. Plus the ref is clearly watching the block if you look above in the individual frames. Great Block Jerrell!
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Rec'd.
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Seeing the play broken down like this...
makes me appreciate how awesome of a play it was even more.
And if you look really close
You can see a flash of light near the grassy knoll.
by Gaknar on Sep 20, 2010 9:26 AM CDT reply actions 2 recs
From my only slightly biased opinion...
I wouldn’t say it was a missed call. But i wouldn’t call it totally legal either. To me, it looks like one of those borderline calls that could go either way, depending on if the ref had an itchy hand or not. I’ve seen worse not get flagged, and less visual offenses get called. jmo.
I can see an argument that it wouldn't have been surprising to see a flag there
but it WAS a legal block. There’s no ifs, ands, or buts about it. A “Block in the back” has the requirement of being, for starters, “in the back”. This one was not, as the photos above show.
Not disagreeing that I’ve seen blocks like that flagged before, and at the speed it was going, it certainly wouldn’t have been the most egregious call a ref had ever made, but it was 100% the right call. It’s not logical to argue that it’s in any way a block in the back.
I guess i can't be 100% of something off grainy youtube stills.
To each his own i guess. I’m kind of wishy washy like that. :-)
by WillieWannabe on Sep 20, 2010 11:29 PM CDT up reply actions
Well, the first picture, you can see them engaged and you can clearly see
the SDSU player’s back. None of his number is obscured; he’s clearly facing the Mizzou player.
The second shot, which is as much as 2 seconds later (more likely 1.5 second), it’s reasonably clear that he’s being blocked from the side, since you can not see any of his front number.
After that point, it becomes a little less clear, but the question is this:
If the blocker starts blocking from the front, and the defensive player turns his body, does that make it a block in the back?
I can’t imagine that a defensive player would be allowed, by the rules, to turn a legal block into an illegal block just by turning around.
That being said, in the third shot, he defensive player begins to turn his hips, but his upper body is still being blocked from the side, as his shoulder pad is dipping to the left of the screen (i.e. you can begin to make out some of his back, but NONE of his front is visible above the waist).
In the 4th shot, which is less than a second later, you can clearly see his back numbers, but you can also see JJ’s front numbers, and his hand is not on the defender’s back which implies that he is pulling off the block. But, again, even if you do argue that JJ is blocking from the back at that point, the bock had been engaged for nearly 2 seconds before the defender was able to turn his body enough to get to that point. That is not an illegal block.
If you want to claim that the screen shots are too grainy to see what I just described, then I guess that’s your perception, but I’m completely comfortable saying with 100% certainty that it was a legal block based on the evidence at hand.
Can you imagine the buzz kill had there been a flag there?
Excellent break down. You don’t see detailed posts like this one around sbnation all that often. Nice work as usual.
One thing lost here
is even if it was flagged and the play nullified, we still had a minute of potential Moejo left in that game. Who says we wouldn’t have seen Moe part 2 on the next play?
That's a good breakdown, thank you for doing it
Needless to say, our Aztec friends are not quite convinced. Maybe they blame Ebner’s overconfidence for blinding the official.
"I'm a genius, but I'm a misunderstood genius."
"What's misunderstood about you?"
"Nobody thinks I'm a genius."
by Transmogrified Tiger on Sep 20, 2010 2:47 PM CDT reply actions
executed to perfection!
that was a perfect block.
You don't have to come and confess, we lookin' for you, we gon' find you, we gon' find you. So you can run and tell that, Homeboy.
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