Replay Still Under Review

Instant replay for this season’s playoffs remained under review Tuesday, with team and NFL officials looking for a consensus on how to avoid the game-turning calls that even the league acknowledges were blown.

“Right now it remains a possibility, not yet a probability,” NFL spokesman Joe Browne said.

The league announced Monday it is considering a form of replay for the playoffs. The format would give each team two challenges plus an emergency challenge at the discretion of the referee in the last two minutes, and the decision would be made by the referee looking at a sideline monitor.

There were signs that longtime opponents were willing to return to replay to stem the criticism after three well-publicized gaffes--the coin flip in the Pittsburgh-Detroit game on Thanksgiving; the calls that gave New England a win over Buffalo; and the touchdown that sent the New York Jets to a 32-31 win over Seattle on Sunday when replays showed Vinny Testaverde came up short of the end zone.

Jerry Seeman, the director of officials, told Seattle Coach Dennis Erickson that head linesman Earnie Frantz, who ruled Testaverde was over the goal line, had mistaken Testaverde’s white helmet for the brown ball.

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Brett Favre is running out of passing targets and linemen to protect him, and the Packers are running out of time.

Favre lost center Frank Winters and three receivers in Green Bay’s 24-22 loss to the Buccaneers. So he’s more realistic than optimistic right now.

“The good thing is if we win next week, we’re in the playoffs,” Favre said. “But I don’t know if we’ll have anybody to play with when we get to the playoffs.”

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The mother of one of Ben Coates’ children testified Tuesday that the New England Patriot tight end pushed her to the pavement and hit her head on a car outside his condominium.

Jennifer Marshall’s testimony came on the first day of Coates’ trial on an assault and battery charge stemming from a confrontation outside his Franklin, Mass., home on July 26. He has pleaded not guilty, saying he was defending himself from an attack by Marshall.

In his opening statement, defense attorney Mark Berthiaume said, “This is a case about a woman who is motivated by greed and anger” and that Coates tried to avoid a confrontation. “There is no question that on that night she set out to make him pay.”