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Joel Klatt makes interesting recommendation to CFB’s targeting rule
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Targeting is the worst rule in college football and a precious few disagree. It is often called and enforced with extreme subjectivity and, in all but the most extreme cases, feels arbitrary and punitive in a way that does not help, but in fact hurts the competitive balance of a game.
Beyond being simply a difficult and an often sketchy penalty to isolate, the punishment for the offending player—an ejection from the game—is the embodiment of a draconian price to pay. There are cases when, in the course of a tight, clean game, a team’s best defensive player will get caught in a dubious targeting situation and ejected, tilting the balance of power and adding an unmistakable taint to the remainder of the contest.
The rule was created with the best of intentions, that being player safety, but its practical consequences seem in many cases to destroy its perceived benefits. FOX College Football’s lead game analyst, Joel Klatt, a regular critic of the rule, has seen enough.
In both a Twitter post and later a video, Klatt went after the rule with a vengeance, calling it both, “the worst part of the game,” and pleading for it to be fixed. College football fans hope the right people in the right places were listening to Klatt’s sermon.
Preach on:
CFB has to fix the Targeting foul by creating 2 categories of enforcement:
— Joel Klatt (@joelklatt) October 25, 2020
1) Normal action of football – Player stays in game
2) Crown with intent – Player is ejected
Said it today and believe it with everything I am…It is the worst part of the game and it needs to be fixed
“There needs to be two categories of targeting so that we can have a targeting penalty during the course of action, but then that player is not thrown out of the game.”@JoelKlatt reacts to @HuskerFBNation's Deontai Williams being ejected due to targeting ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/9Z7kW8s1E9
— FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) October 25, 2020
Mark Schipper is a reporter, sportswriter, and aspiring novelist living in Chicago, Illinois.