Crime & Punishment

This post is a continuation of the thoughts presented in 'The Problem with Referees is Penalties.' Just so we're clear. It is apparent (to me anyway) that the majority continue to see the game and penalties in particular as necessarily punitive and a deterrent to the overwhelming impulse of virtually every paintball player to cheat the game somehow someway every chance they get. While not a great surprise it's a hurdle that must be overcome. (Btw, thanks to all who chose to comment. 55 and counting and less than half of them are Brockdorf. Agree or disagree the dialogue is what counts.)

Let's look at the situations posed in the first post again.
1.  OTB a player runs upfield shooting his gun. Somewhere during the run he takes an obvious hit to a location that can't be seen unless or until he stops running and purposefully checks. The player runs to the X-side still shooting. There weren't any bunkers along his path and the run after the hit took maybe two seconds.
There was near universal agreement on this one. Throw the red flag! But what if he stopped shooting when he felt the possible hit but kept running until he reached his intended primary? On the run how fast is the player supposed to recognize the potential hit and alter his actions--and is it okay or not okay to proceed to his primary before he checks? Is he just an elimination now or does some penalty still apply?
Or, what if he does exactly as in scenario one but upon reaching his primary checks himself and raises a hand and leaves the field?

2.  A D-wire player has a pack hit on the inside where the ref on the wire can't see it. The player makes a move to run down an opponent and shoots him, then drops into the next bunker at which point the ref sees the pack hit.
I confess the mixed response here was a bit confusing. It was the only scenario in which an opponent was actually eliminated by a hit player--and yet a strong minority favored a minor penalty. I think the distinction many made was that the player in this scenario had an unobvious hit--and for deterrence to be effective it has to deter intentional acts. But what about the level playing field? What about fairness? Game balance?

3.  A player takes the snake OTB but takes a clean hit the sideline ref sees. When the player dives into the snake he doesn't stop at the first knuckle instead he crawls as fast as he can to the fifty.

And upon reaching the fifty he checks himself, finds the hit and raises his hand. Still a penalty? When does the ref throw the flag? Or what if the ref who saw the hit immediately follows the player and finally gets his attention when he's done crawling. If the ref simply eliminates the player where's the harm? Did the action of possibly drawing the opposition's attention for an extra couple of seconds really merit the red flag most were prepared to throw?

4.  Still in the snake a player is tucked in taking some heat. Suddenly he gets tattooed in the back and spins then shoots. Even Stevie Wonder couldn't get this call wrong it is so blatantly obvious what happened and when.

It was so obvious everyone was ready to throw the red flag but it was also so obvious it would have also been as easily ignored too. What if the ref simply pulled the eliminated snake player and wiped off the other player and let the point continue to play out? Do you make a call anyway because the only way for that particular point to be played fairly is to penalize the spinner or does the spinner get a penalty only because you hope to keep the next guy from spinning?

Today we have basically two penalties; a minor and a major. In divisional we always pull bodies. We pull bodies in part because for as long as most can remember that's what you do to penalize a team when their player breaks a rule. But imagine calling today's major back in 10-man days--you'd have to pull 4 bodies to make the penalties equivalent. Our current situation is we play a game that has changed in many dramatic ways while we rely on clumsier less refined versions of yesterday's penalties to define that game. Isn't it possible there's a better way?