Couch Slouch takes stand: He’d ban all instant replay

Every time I pledge to never write another instant-replay column, I break my promise. What happens is this – I wait until 237,000 people have shouted deep into the night that we absolutely positively have to have replay to officiate games properly, and, then, after shaving and showering, I sit down to record my thoughts, which can be summed up thusly:

NO INSTANT REPLAY.

I realize the horse is out of the barn on this one already – in fact, many of those horses, and their rear ends, have their own sports talk shows on radio – but it’s important to reiterate the simple and sane point that replay is repugnant. Sometimes technology liberates us and sometimes it strangles us. Replay as an officiating tool diminishes the sports landscape so forcefully, I can’t believe otherwise reasonable folks can’t see it; rather, they’re shouting, “You’ve got to challenge that!”

Sure, with replay, we get the call right more often. But at what price?

First of all, the video evidence often is inconclusive. Then again, all of life is inconclusive, except when they’re out of your favorite flavor at Ben & Jerry’s and when you’re dead.

(When the doctor toe-tags you, that’s when you want to throw the challenge flag, but, alas, you can’t.)

Second of all – and more importantly – replay ruins the pure pleasure of sports viewing.

Before television, we concentrated on the result of every play, not the officiating of every play; bad calls came and went without fanfare. With TV, and its ability to replay every play, we now see, or think we can see, everything. Once you extend the officiating function beyond the field – and allow for the possibility of checking or challenging every call – you change the entire sports experience, for the worse. The game is no longer the thing, the refs are the thing; on most plays – and certainly on every decisive play – you look at the officiating to see if anything was botched.

(Column Intermission: As we approach NFL midseason, I stand proudly by my Team of Destiny, the 4-3 Philadelphia Eagles. Picked for last in the NFC East, the Eagles are inexorably Super Bowl-bound. People dumped on Kevin Kolb at season’s start; I did not. I don’t even mind if I sprain my arm patting myself on the back, because I have a great health-care plan.)

These days, many college football games start in mid-afternoon and don’t finish until midnight, thanks to replay; next thing you know, they will review halftime pep talks. Actually, I wouldn’t mind if replay could check to see how many SEC quarterbacks and Big Ten linemen go to class – that would be a game-changer.

Recently, the Little League World Series opted for replay.

Just as insanely, professional bowling will use replay this season.

What’s next, replay in poker?

(I guess it could be used to confirm if Scotty Nguyen ordered a Dewar’s or an O’Doul’s.)

Replay sucks away drama and spoils great endings.

Two Sundays ago, the Vikings’ Brett Favre found Percy Harvin in the back of the end zone in the final minute for an apparent game-winning, 35-yard touchdown pass against the Packers. Granted, Harvin’s right foot landed in the parking lot – so the score was overturned – but it would’ve become part of lore, and then Favre walks out of Lambeau Field a winner his final time, free to go home triumphantly to his cell phone.

Plus, if you’re looking at the video to see if a receiver’s foot landed in bounds, what happens when you notice that a defensive back pulled a knife and tried to cut off the receiver’s left ear just before the catch? This isn’t a slippery slope, my friends, it’s Mount Kilimanjaro.

Frankly, we take more time to review plays in the NFL than we do to commit a trillion dollars to a seven-year war. If we, the people, had replay as an officiating tool, I’m convinced the U.S. would not have invaded Iraq. How is it we spend an eternity to figure out if a running back’s knee touched the ground before he fumbled while Colin Powell went to the United Nations Security Council in 2003, showed a bunch of charts and slides and – bang! – we were bombing Baghdad by nightfall? I remember seeing that computer-generated image of Iraq’s WMD facility, yet four months later it was determined the Iraqis had no biological weapons.

Where was the booth review on that one?

Ask The Slouch

Q. Yo, Slouch, as a fellow wayward soul, do you have any defense for Brett Favre? (Russ Smith; Oakland, Calif.)

A. My mother always told me: Don’t talk to strangers. My wife always tells me: Don’t text hostesses. Maybe Brett was never coached properly by the women in his life.

Q. How come pitchers put on their warm-up jacket when they get on base? (James Caruthers; Baytown, Texas)

A. Coincidentally, Charlie Sheen does the same thing when he walks into a brothel.

Q. Do you think World Series TV ratings would improve if they started every game in the sixth inning? (David Landau; Potomac, Md.)

A. Pay the man, Shirley.