The Titans believed they had recovered a muffed punt at the Houston Texans' 9-yard line last Sunday at LP Field after a ball bounced off Jacoby Jones and into the arms of Tennessee's Jason McCourty. The rookie had given Jones, who called for a fair catch, enough room to catch the punt.
But no. Because the ball bounced off Jones and didn't hit the turf first, officials awarded possession to the Texans and tossed in a 15-yard penalty against the Titans for fair-catch interference. The Texans didn't score a touchdown on the drive that followed the third-quarter penalty, but they went on to win 34-31.
So expect the fair-catch rule to come up for discussion during the offseason, especially since Titans coach Jeff Fisher is co-chairman of the NFL's competition committee.
"It just doesn't look right," Fisher said. "There's no way we can coach a player not to hit the return man or go after the ball once the ball bounces out of his hands. You can't wait for the ball to hit the ground and then jump on it. To me, I think we need to look at it. Again, it was the correct call considering our current rules.
"The hard thing about this play when you see it is we've got the ball, first down at the 9-yard line, and now we don't have the ball and they assess the 15-yard penalty on top of it."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
