PylonCam paid off for ABC

There are a lot of cases of replay reviews going wrong. On Saturday, in South Carolina’s surprisingly close loss at No. 7 Alabama, the ESPN on ABC broadcast provided almost a Platonic form of how these can go right.

On a late Gamecocks’ play that was initially ruled an incompletion on the field, analyst Jesse Palmer quickly identified that this might be reversed on review. Play-by-play voice Joe Tessitore then added to that, and rules analyst Matt Austin provided a former official’s perspective suggesting that yes, this call would likely change. And ABC’s PylonCam provided an excellent angle reinforcing those opinions. And then the on-field officials confirmed the overturn of the initial call after review:

The whole process of replay review often works nowhere nearly as smoothly as this. It’s a difficult task for commentators to recognize what might happen in real-time, and for rules analysts to weigh in quickly; they have more specific knowledge and experience than the main game broadcasters, which is why that role exists. But even their experience doesn’t always line up perfectly with what decision will be made.

And while special cameras like the PylonCam get a lot of buzz, they’re certainly not in the right place every time. But the stars all aligned in this instance for an important moment, and it produced an almost-perfect broadcast handling of this.

Ultimately, this ruling didn’t impact the final outcome. South Carolina’s two-point conversion attempt to tie the game sailed incomplete, and while the Gamecocks shockingly recovered an onside kick , that was followed by an interception. That left the Crimson Tide with a 27-25 win, and meant they avoided the ignominy of two straight conference losses (following last week’s upset defeat at Vanderbilt).

But this was still a moment where the game broadcasters, the rules analyst, and the special camera footage aligned and noted that a call would be overturned before that was announced. And it was an example of how well this all can work under the right circumstances.

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