[Article] GM's might be changing the offside rules

[Hairy Kneel]

NHL fixing its dumb coach’s challenge offside problems

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CHICAGO – At some point since its inception, the NHL’s coach’s challenge for goals scored on potentially offside plays went from a good intentioned rule to a tedious, counterproductive parsing of pixels on a video review screen.

“The players don’t like it, like the fans and media,” said NHL executive vice president Colin Campbell on Thursday, at the League’s general manager meeting in Chicago. “We’re trying to temper it a little bit. We want to take care of the obvious offside.”

That was, in fact, the spirit of the rule when offside plays were allowed to be challenged beginning in 2015. The catalyst was the still-baffling blown call in 2013, when Matt Duchene was basically in Aspen when the puck finally crossed the blue line:

But as we’ve all seen, the rule has been abused. It went from being a correction for egregious mistakes to a myopic carnival of inconclusive guesswork.

The NHL has decided to correct the correction.

One option would have been to rewrite the rulebook on offside, allow for more close calls to fly by. But the GMs had no appetite for that.

“If it’s offside, it’s offside. We gotta make the right call,” said Jim Nill, Dallas Stars general manager.

So they went with a more interesting, and potentially game-changing, solution: If a team challenges a goal for being offside, and that challenge fails, then they’re assessed a minor penalty for delay of game.

Teams would no longer need to have a timeout to challenge offside plays, as the penalty for wasting everyone’s time was deemed punishment enough.

Please note that this is strictly for offside coach’s challenges – the challenges for goalie interference still require a timeout anted up by the team.

Credit where it’s due: This is an ingenious fix. It raises the stakes for those borderline challenges that are far from sure-things.

Imagine it’s a tie game and then one team scores a goal. The other team considers a challenge on a close call at the blue line … and then it considers the fact that if the challenge fails, the scoring team would have a chance to follow this goal with another power-play goal. Kick, wham, stunner, and it’s a two-goal deficit because you used the challenge.

This is a nice deterrent.

The NHL also looked at the amount of time that goes by between the offside play and the goal being scored in a challenge. How many goals were scored in first five seconds after the zone entry? How many were scored in eight seconds, or 10 seconds or one minute or two minutes.

Turns out two thirds of the goals scored that are challenged are after five seconds.

“For example with Nashville, the offside had nothing to do with the P.K. Subban goal. It was a minute and a half later,” said Campbell of an infamous goal called back in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final.

The NHL decided not to make changes to that aspect of the rule.

As for the delay of game penalty, they still need approval from the competition committee, which is likely, and the NHL Board of Governors. But it could be added to the rulebook for the 2017-18 season.

“It had resounding support. Like, only one team disagreed,” said Campbell. “If you want to make a challenge, you better be sure.”

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Greg Wyshynski 

Puck Daddy

[Toews]

I hate the offside challenge so much. Just do away with it all together. Most offsides aren't like Duchene's, its one step here, half a step there. I hate having to dread after a crucial goal whether it gets called back or not.

[Qwags]

If you have to slow down the play to get a good look at it, then you're missing the point of an offside.

[Hairy Kneel]

Plus there's that blind spot on the near boards. Plus some really miniscule visual checks.

[Zhukini]

Just get rid of the whole your skate has to be on the ice for the review nonsense

[ynwa]

Drop the coach's challenge for offside. It's a boring waste of time, without it things will more than likely even up over the course of a season. Also while we're at it, let's get rid of the over the glass delay of game. Another stupid, irritating rule.

[Ghostsof1915]

Just switch to No Touch Icing. Fixes everything.

[Rick Blight]

Teams will challenge every goal the Canucks score............nothing to lose with our PP.

[shad0w4life]

Poor boeser, that offside in playoffs that was so close and ended up disallowing gwg for ND. 

[c00kies]

1 hour ago, Toews said:

I hate the offside challenge so much. Just do away with it all together. Most offsides aren't like Duchene's, its one step here, half a step there. I hate having to dread after a crucial goal whether it gets called back or not.

Honestly, this is probably the best way to go. I would like it left for obvious calls, or maybe the refs can re-evaluate a replay if one deems it is offside. The refs can still use a replay to see an obvious blunder like the Duchene goal, and do it without delaying the game.

 

Vrbata had a meaningless goal called back against Toronto late in a game, and that was because Henrik, well away from the play, was just a bit offside. It didn't make an impact on the play at all, but the goal was still reviewed and the goal was called back.

 

In my opinion, they also have to be deemed directly offside. I didn't pay too much attention to all the calls, but if the play has in been in the zone for 30 seconds, the team has recovered from the advantage of the offside (again, hopefully a slight offside), and the offside wouldn't have directly led to the goal.

 

Edit: The penalty for an unsuccessful challenge should be a penalty AND a loss of the timeout. 

[c00kies]

25 minutes ago, 6of1_halfdozenofother said:

Problem is: play should've been stopped at the point of the offside infraction, so the subsequent 2-240 seconds are irrelevant to the legitimacy of the goal.  ie. the goal should still not count regardless of whether it was scored 5 seconds after the offside happened or 5 minutes after the offside happened, as long as play remained inside the zone.  The only consideration I might make is if control of the puck changed teams during the post-offside / pre-goal play, but then again, that can be extremely subjective itself.

Just treat the missed offside like a missed penalty. In both cases the play was close enough to be uncalled, and in both cases the official made the non-call.

 

[Kragar]

The challenge doesn't bother me so much, because I would rather see them get it right.  What does bother me is that I remember some commentator saying last year that often linesmen were being more lenient with close calls, relying on the challenge to get it right if need be.  

 

Problem there is, if it is off-side, and the play continues, that will often lead to the defending side having to work harder defensively.  This can lead to defensive penalties which cannot be cancelled out by a challenge on the offside.  Maybe it balances it out, but it leads to penalties that should never have occurred, and ultimately has the potential to impact the game.

 

IMO, linesman need to call them just as tight as before the review came in.  

 

And, for what it's worth (not much), my homer glasses show me that the Canucks don't get the same benefit when we are on the offense, with close calls at the line less likely to go our way than other teams.  Nothing statistical to back that up... just my biased opinion there.

[Slegr]

It really is such a stupid, time-delaying thing, the coach's challenge for offside. If they're so by-the-book, wanting to make sure it's 'on side', why can it only apply directly after a goal is scored? For instance, what if a team came in offside, but the other team's goalie covered it right away, creating a new face-off, but the  off-side team scores right off the face off? Shouldn't that be allowed to be challenged too? It's all so lame. If the linesmen miss it, it gets missed. That's part of the game. There are a lot of missed calls in any game. 

[Qwags]

They should upgrade the cameras while they're at it. Feels like I'm watching replays through a potato.

[MikeyBoy44]

Make cameras strictly to send the game to my tv. Stop reviewing everything all together. 

[Lionized27]

On 6/23/2017 at 9:32 PM, Qwags said:

They should upgrade the cameras while they're at it. Feels like I'm watching replays through a potato.

Or, to be fair to everyone (fans included), replays for off-side coaches challenges can only be watched at full speed. 

Slowing it down and zooming in obviously isn't working. 

[Ghostsof1915]

Great SuperBee logo Lionized27.

[Lionized27]

19 minutes ago, Ghostsof1915 said:

Great SuperBee logo Lionized27.

Gotta represent! 

 

[Apple Juice]

I think the easy fix would be if the goal is under review for offside, as long as the foot/skate is behind the blue line or hovering on it, then it's onside. Cameras that they have aren't 1080p to the point where they can see the blade actually on the ice even when zoomed in. Until they can get better camera lenses, change it so that as long as the foot is behind/on the blue line, then it's onside

[IBatch]

On 23/06/2017 at 4:30 PM, Toews said:

I hate the offside challenge so much. Just do away with it all together. Most offsides aren't like Duchene's, its one step here, half a step there. I hate having to dread after a crucial goal whether it gets called back or not.

Not only that nine times out of ten the goals seem good and wouldnt have been stopped if the player wasn't cheating a bit either.