PHOENIX -- Under a new rule voted for a one-year trial by NFL owners on Tuesday night was making offensive and defensive pass interference plays reviewable, something that might have put the Steelers in the postseason in 2018 had it been in place.
While the Steelers weren't initially in favor of adding to plays that could be reviewed in replay, there was a big push for increased replay among the league's ownership as a group.
Eventually, that led to the passing of a rule that will permit coaches to challenge plays in the first 28 minutes of each half, both plays that were called penalties and those that were not, while the replay officials will handle calls in the final two minutes. The provision passed by a 31-1 vote, with the Bengals reportedly being the only team to vote against it.
"It will be for one year and we'll see how it goes," Steelers president Art Rooney II said. "I think there was probably more interest this year in doing something with replay than I've seen in a few years. I guess a lot of it had to do with a couple of plays we saw in the playoffs. I kind of thought we could see some change in replay."
Had the rule been in place in 2018, the Steelers could have potentially won a game in New Orleans in Week 16. The Saints benefitted from a pair of fourth-down interference calls on Joe Haden that not only kept drives alive, but resulted in touchdowns in both cases in the 31-28 Saints' victory.
That loss dropped the Steelers a half-game behind the Ravens in the AFC North standings, knocking them out of the postseason the following week when Baltimore defeated the Browns.
But the Saints were then bounced out of the playoffs in the NFC Championship because of a pass interference penalty that was not called on the field, sending the Rams to the Super Bowl.
Coaches will still only have two challenges per game, so they will have to be judicious with their usage.
"I think it’s realistic to say plays annually stimulate discussion involving replay," said Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin, who sits on the league's Competition Committee. "We’d all like to get to a point where we are not reactionary in our reactions and forward thinking, but you have to acknowledge that there have been plays that stimulated a lot of these discussions, whether it’s what we are talking about here, or whether it was a catch or not a catch from a few years ago. It’s annually singular plays that stimulate significant discussions that are a catalyst for change."
A couple of proposals that didn't gain much traction -- at least not this year -- were changing the rules of overtime and adding a sky judge.
Rooney said both proposals will probably be brought up again in the future, but were too complex in the way they were submitted this year for passage.
"I think there's a lot more to that than just saying, 'let's add a sky judge.'" Rooney said. "Is New York still in the replay system or not? So there's a lot to that which is more complicated than we were willing to deal with this year.
"We had a lot of discussion about overtime and I think the rule that was proposed had a lot of pieces to it that it just got more complicated than we could deal with. There were a couple of amendments that were added at one point. I think it will still be something that will be discussed again, probably next year. But it just was a little too many pieces to the proposal that got onto the floor today."
Also rejected was a rule that would have replaced the onside kick with a fourth-and-15 play. NFL teams converted far fewer onside kicks in 2018 because players must now remain stationary until the ball is kicked off, but that proposal also had a lot of moving parts that doomed it.
Those changes in the kickoff rules to keep players stationary, which were used on a trial basis last season, were made permanent Tuesday.
The league also outlawed all blindside blocks in the name of player safety, taking one of the more vicious hits out of the game. Teams also will now be permitted to elect to enforce on the succeeding try or on the succeeding free kick an opponent’s personal or unsportsmanlike conduct foul committed during a touchdown, essentially for excessive celebration.
Prior to this, teams had to take the penalty on the ensuing kickoff. Now they can make a choice to accept the penalty on the PAT or two-point conversion try, moving the ball farther from the end zone.
