Rawky77

The Saints are in an uproar along with NFL espn brain trust about the missed facemask penalty prior to the fumble in the closing mins of the game.

Can someone hear pls explain how the facemask penalty being called would have changed the outcome of this play?

My take is this:

If the ref had seen the facemask grab and called it all he would have done is throw a flag and then waited for the play to finish to blow his whistle to stop play.

If i am correct, calling the penalty would have not have given the ball back to the Saints all it would have done is given the recovered ball to the Vikes 15 yds further from their goal line.

So why the big deal about a missed call that would not have changed the outcome of the play, which was a fumble recovered by the Vikes, change of possession?

So am i correct or am i missing something?

jmt57

The Saints would have kept the ball since the penalty occured prior to the turnover, if I'm not mistaken. I could be wrong, but it is similar to roughing the passer penalties where the offense keeps the ball even though the pass ends up being intercepted. It would be unfair to reward the Vikings for a play that was affected by their penalty. If they had a facemask after the ball was recovered, during the runback of the fumble, that's different; in that case they would keep the ball, but fifteen yards back from the spot of the foul.

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