GB@NYG: Airspace yes; paydirt no

Everyone — announcers, Green Bay’s offensive unit, and, most critically, down judge Tom Stephan, who gets plowed over on this play — agrees the Packers’ Malik Heath broke the plane when he reached for the goal line at this moment late in Green Bay’s Monday night matchup with the Giants.

Everyone, including us, agrees that according to the existing rule, Heath’s goal line wave-over qualifies for six points, even though Heath never touched any portion of the end zone. That’s due to some determined effort by New York rookie cornerback Deonte Banks (25).

But is this a good rule? If you say yes, then we disagree.

Instead, we believe to qualify for football’s highest payout, six points, high standards should be met. That would include requiring every ball carrier to make physical contact, however minimal, with the end zone when the ball breaks the plane. Otherwise, we wind up with another unsatisfying oddity, yet another no-touch touchdown. We say no thanks. Hocus Bogus Rating: 5 

DET@CHI: Cut that corner

Speaking of no-touch touchdowns, Chicago’s Justin Fields successfully avoided the end zone, using the break-the-plane rule to sidestep two fast-closing Detroit defenders, safety Kerby Joseph (31) and lineman Aidan Hutchison (97).

Likely in no mood to take a hit, Fields dodged being tackled by simply hopping the pylon and landing a foot or more out of bounds — essentially expanding the width of the scoring area. Hardly seems fair to the defense, does it?

Fields never touched the end zone, of course, but he nevertheless collected six points because, it is believed, the ball in his right hand passed over some portion of the pylon, thus weirdly qualifying for a touchdown. We consider the entire process a big leap of faith. Rating: 4.5

PHI@DAL: Nowhere man

Can any definitive ruling be made while watching Rico Dowdle’s grinding push toward the line of scrimmage? Yes. It is clear he did not touch the end zone.

If our rule was in effect — a ball carrier must physically contact some portion of the end zone to be awarded six points — much of the replay reviewing and all of the hand-wringing over the play’s outcome could have been avoided.

Two different sets of announcers shared the same view — Dowdle was short of the end zone. Replays showed he never touched it. Yet someone equipped either with X-ray vision or telepathy determined Dowdle had broken the Great Invisible Plane and handed the lad a heaping helping of six points.

Our rule would simplify the game. Speed it up. So it’ll never happen. Rating: 4

TEN@MIA: A little short

Analyst Lous Riddick expresses what most viewers were thinking while the replay of Raheem Mostert’s goal-line dive rolled: “It looks short.”

We agree. Here is how the NFL Rulebook explains the concept of “down by contact“:

“An official shall declare the ball dead and the down ended:

a) when a runner is contacted by an opponent and touches the ground with any part of his body other than his hands or feet. The ball is dead the instant the runner touches the ground.”

That, we believe, describes Mostert, with his shin on the ground, in the image below. Is it possible a few pebbles of the football’s grain intersect the goal line’s plane? Apparently so, since that was the final ruling. But does that look like a touchdown to you? We’d prefer to see the real thing. Rating: 4