Commissioner’s state of game
He discusses future of Pro Bowl, Chargers and Raiders in state of the league address.
Goodell on ejections, the future of the Pro Bowl and chances of Raiders and Chargers staying put.
SAN FRANCISCO — Is the NFL about to take a page from basketball?
In his annual state of the league address Friday, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said the league should have a policy in which players essentially foul out of a game after two personal fouls. He has talked to the Competition Committee about those types of automatic ejections.
“I believe that that’s consistent with what we believe are the safety issues, but I also believe it’s consistent with what we believe are the standards of sports- manship that we’ve emphasized,” Goodell said.
Goodell was asked specifically about the situation involving New York Giants receiver Odell Beckham Jr., who repeatedly tried to cheap- shot Carolina cornerback Josh Norman, sometimes after the whistle, in a game in December. Some people criticized officials for not taking action against Beckham during that game.
“We should take that out of the hands of the officials when it gets to that point,” Goodell said. “They’ll obviously have to throw the f lag, but when they do, we’ll look to see if we can reach an agreement on the conditions of which they’ll be ejected.… I think it’s consistent with our goals to try and bring sportsmanship back into the kind of play to keep the focus on the game, keep the focus on the great play that is happening.”
Goodell answered ques- tions on a number of topics, among them:
On the future of the Pro Bowl, which had an all- time low overnight rating of 5.0, after getting a 5.6 last year, and a 6.7 in 2014:
“I am not going to speculate on where the Pro Bowl is going, but I was disappointed in what I saw on Sunday.… I think it is very important to have a stage in which you celebrate our great players for what they do on and off the field. We may have to think about that differently than we have in the past. I think our biggest standard has to be what we expect from the NFL and what our fans expect from the NFL. If it is not quality, and if it is not real competition that we can be proud of, then we have to do something different.”
On the chances of San Diego and Oakland keeping their teams, in light of the Chargers agreeing in principle to join the Rams in Inglewood if they can’t get a deal done in San Diego this year:
“Over the past year, we’ve seen each of those communities express that they don’t have proper facilities for the long term for their teams. They’ve also indicated that they have not been able to come up with the right solution. Our pledge is to try to help them get that done. I think it’s great that [ Chargers owner] Dean Spanos and his family said we want to make this work in San Diego. They have an incredibly attractive option in Los Angeles, but they decided we’re going to go and try to make this work in San Diego. We will do everything we can to support them. The same is true for [ Raiders owner] Mark Davis.”