Opinion: How would YOU adjust the targeting rule?

No change of rule is going to make violence moot.

The argument is an argument.

Play coed frisbee.

Not FB.

That a doctor of medicine presides at Michigan is as big a joke as his puted defense of the sport to students who would question its morality to calm alums and walmart wolves alike.  Carry on your academic crusade Mark.  Where are the brains of 1:100 who don't have them anymore, Mark?  You seem to have lost sight of something.  Others have simply lost sight.

Does it matter if a boy chooses to don the winged helmet?  Yes it does.

Can this rule be fixed?  No it can't.

Keep it real.

Happy New Year.

Go Blue!

I hate the part where they kick the kid out of the game and part of the next. Just have the 15yd penalty, auto 1st down.

You can tell when it looks intentional, hard to call when its a last second movement by one of the players.

Add in sufficiently vague language that allows refs to take last-second change of direction into account.

Defenders shouldn't be penalized for attempting a tackle on a player's chest, only for said player to dip his head down. At that point, the defender has zero intention of hitting the offensive player in the head but can't do anything about it. 

Also, blindside (AKA blatant and legitimately dangerous) targeting should receive a full game suspension.

The Illinois one was trash. Kid used his shoulder.

Osu Wade - led with crown & legit call.

I’d start by telling Lane Kiffin to stop targeting Chris Partridge. 

Two things:

1. Targeting should be called on offensive players who lower their heads and initiate helmet-to-helmet contact with a defender. Call it both ways and I think you'll see a lot of the questionable calls go away. Right now the ball carrier can target with impunity.
2. Targeting on QB slides should not be called if the slide happens too late for the defender to stop. Cf: that prick Erin Rodgers. He's notorious for sliding late so that defenders have already reached the point of no return, then he ducks enough to get a glancing blow and get the penalty. The announcers even called it out on Sunday when he did it against the Lions.

i don't have a problem with the call on Wade; i think that was clearly leading with the crown of his helmet and would have been reviewed for targeting even if Lawrence didn't try protecting himself.

There should be a mechanism to distinguish accidental from egregious targeting however... the problem is that there is some subjectivity so you are reliant on the competence (and objectivity) of the refs.

Auto ejections for egregious hits is fine and should be kept, but the accidental ones? Probably not....but the penalty could be something like suspended for a quarter maybe?

Level 1/Level 2.

The one that makes this most obvious is not the Ohio State hit, which was a dangerous hit and merited an ejection.  Instead, the targeting call that went against Illinois yesterday is the one that illustrates a necessity in the rule change.  Dude led with his shoulder, principle point of contact was the WR's shoulder, but made incidental contact with the WR's head.  By the letter of the rule, had to be tossed.  But he was definitely trying to do the right thing.

The OSU or Oklahoma incidents would still be ejections in my book.  With a long suspension for the OU kid.

Make degrees like basketball. Flagrant 1, flagrant 2, etc.

Way too many plays where intent matters.

I think a 'strike zone' could be a good idea.  If you're within that zone anything goes and would be something like from the upper chest down to the feet.  If an offensive player dips his head down into the strike zone it's fair game.  If you're standing upright and a defender comes up out of the zone and makes contact that's a penalty.  Other rules would have to be implemented for sliding QBs, etc. but making it as black and white as possible would be better than referees using judgement calls that are often one thing to one ref and another to someone other ref.  I realize baseball has subjective strike zones as well but a standard seems to be needed.  If you're still reviewing calls you can better judge a strike in the zone vs one out of the zone and have a pretty good standard.

Doesn't matter to me.  Will be "interpreted" in a way that fucks Michigan down the road at some point no matter the rule book.  Just like PI, the calls will go in OSU's favor when that game is close. Hell, even Pedo State gets calls against us like this year.

I would throw it out.  It's terribly officiated and ruining the game.  The obvious cheap shot to the head should be called and that is a much easier call.  

Only one change: no targeting of Partridge. 
 

Also, I would remove the face mask from helmets.  This will reduce violent hits using helmets, including targeting. 

Blatant targeting = current rules

Non-blatant = sit remainder of current defensive possession + the following defensive possession. 

2nd non-blatant targeting in same game = ejection from game.

Make it a 15 yard penalty for leading with the helmet. That’s poor tackling form and a dangerous play. But I wouldn’t eject the player. It’s just way too arbitrary. If you target in the first minute of the game, the penalty is extremely more harsh than targeting in the 59th minute. Removing a player from the next game for something they do in the current game doesn’t make sense to me.

We’re borrowing from the wrong sport. Instead of red-carding a player for targeting, we should have them sit in the penalty box for 5 minutes.

As long as they find a way where there aren’t any targeting calls like they called on Joe Bolden in 2015 vs MSU, the rule can stay the same.

Half the distance to the goal regardless of field position. No ejections on first offense unless malicious intent.  Second offense follows standard ejection rules regardless of intent. Malicious intent targetings are a 3 half suspension.

This isn’t popular, but so be it:

Make it stricter. You hit a guy in the head or with your head and it’s automatic. Potentially penalize runners who draw this sort of thing by lowering their head, too. 

The evidence is pretty powerful that head injuries are a serious problem. Football needs to get head hits as far out of the game as they can before legislation or legal rulings step in to do it for them (see the emerging NIL issue that the NCAA is now chasing).

So the rules need to be so strict that guys will actively avoid anything that could potentially result in an inadvertent head hit in the first place. Judgment calls on “intent” are difficult to discern and need not be involved at all. If the head is involved in a collision, someone is leaving the game. Will it change the game? Sure, a bit. It is still possible to tackle without using the head, though. It needs to happen.

Remember, football is getting faster and stronger (hello PEDs). The major CTE news has mostly surrounded guys from older generations. There are still guys from the 90s and 00s whose prime occurred before targeting rules became a thing who have yet to confront the true depth of the damage done by 250 pound men running 4.3 40s hitting them head on 10-20 times a game. When that becomes a reality, the solution needs to be in place already.

I think that this question includes an incorrect assumption. The rule is not to penalize a player for having bad intent or purposefully doing the wrong thing. The rule is to mitigate actions that result in dangerous plays. Society has determined that certain blows to the head are too dangerous. Regardless of how they came about. 

Consequently, if a players deliver a blow to the head of another player with his helmet that player may be ejected. The circumstances and the intent are not germane. The thing that wasn't supposed to happen has happened. The damage is done. An ejection will follow. It is beholden upon the player to avoid such an occurrence and/or accept the consequences for when it happens.

As I explained to my nephew. These ejections randomly happen every week in college football. One may view it as coming up on the losing end of the random number generator.

I'm not defending it. I'm just describing what I see. Society has determined that football must be safer and this is the result. The alternative is no more football. 

I would give the refs some discretion as to whether it's an ejection or not.

start flagging ball carriers for it

Intent 

Eliminate the next game half suspension.  Its ridiculous.  Targeting is very rarely flagrant and is usually the result of a defender going full speed to make a tackle, and the offensive player's head ducks creating contact.

Take off all the pads and helmets. 

• There should be a tiering system based on severity and whether it was intentional. Tier 1 would be for intentional, ejection for multiple games and 25 yard penalty. Tier 2 would be for reckless, 15 yards and ejection from game. Tier 3 would be incidental, 15 yards and no ejection. I think most would fall into the Tier 3. 
• In the case of a severe violation which results in injury such as a concussion, the offender should be out until the victim can play again. Yes, this seems extreme, but it is a just result. Targeting has the potential to ruin someone’s career and their life... the guilty party should be subject to the same fate as the victim. If the NCAA wants to get serious about head injuries, the rules need to have more severe punishment. 

Watching FSU-ASU

Linebacker hits FSU quarterback in what looked like possible targeting when it happened.

Replay CLEARLY shows several times he didn't lead with his helmet or hit the quarterbacks head.

Gary Danielson blathers on and on that this is targeting and player should he ejected. 

The review got it right. No targeting. How about the announcers not VEHEMENTLY LOBBY . 

Constant tweaking of rules is what causes confusion and inconsistency in application of the changed rule.  The targeting rule in spirit is a good rule, and application of it is getting somewhat more consistent each year.

I would leave the rule as-is and put players and officials through a course in the off season that studies every targeting penalty of the last few years, and use that to improve adherence by the players and application by the refs.