I can agree that in the tuck rule and Johnson plays the refs are looking to the spirit of the law, and that even if it makes no sense to me at least there’s an argument to be had. They might possibly be right. It could have been a tuck. I ask what if it wasn’t, and really the only answer is it is if the ref says it is. The rulebook is vague enough to allow that.
As for Johnson I don’t see how any reasonable person can say he didn’t turn his body and wasn’t in the process of getting back up. But, again, the way the rule is written I guess since they don’t define what the process of a catch is whatever the ref says is part of the process is part of the process. Even when it isn’t.
As for last night’s game I’m not so sure it’s entirely more clear cut than the tuck rule and the Johnson catch. After all, any rule can be interpreted almost any way you want if you’re willing enough. Lawyers make a living at it. Who’s to say what “control” is? Maybe it is whatever the ref says it is, just like a tuck is a tuck when the ref says so or getting up is falling when the ref says so. Common sense and logic tell me Jennings caught it, but what are such faculties in the NFL.
Actually control is a pretty well established idea in the NFL, one hand and your body or two hands on the ball with its movements being the result of your actions and you never lose contact. Jennings got two hands on the ball and never had less than that, yeah Tate managed to move the ball in space but it never moved from Jennings’ hands, and it never moved in his hands, the parts he held onto at the start he still held onto (skidding and pivoting tend to be things they call as losing control).