One of the biggest mysteries of sports is how football officials spot the ball.
The ball is often hidden underneath a tangle of bodies, and it’s hard to believe that there isn’t a little bit of guesswork involved.
It would seem that putting a microchip in the football would make the science a little more precise, but former NFL head of officiating and current Fox NFL analyst Mike Pereira said that’s not the answer.
Pereira said it’s more about determining where the ball carrier’s knee hits the ground.
“You can put a chip in the ball, but then you better put a chip in the guy’s knee, too,” Pereira said on Peter King’s podcast.
There still could be a body obstructing the official’s view of the ball when the knee hits the ground, but Pereira’s point is true especially in goal-line situations when it’s hard to see both the ball and the knee.
NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino said the league won’t be putting chips in footballs anytime soon, and Pereira acknowledged that part of his stance is because he’s a bit of a traditionalist.
“You could set up lasers to replace the chain crews, but I love the tradition of some old guys running out there with a chain,” Pereira said.
Those chain gangs never did much for TV viewers until the yellow first-down line was introduced in 1998. Now, we can’t imagine how we got along without that innovation. Despite the resistance of the traditionalists, perhaps in 10 or 20 years we’ll wonder how they spotted the balls before chips were used.
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