I want to start out by saying I realize this is a pretty radical proposal and is probably impractical/bad, but it's something that I've had on my mind the past few days, and thought it was worth sharing.
There have been a handful of high profile posts about 'unfair' calls. We all know this happens, and many veterans have probably been on both the winning and losing side of some pretty tough calls more than once. No matter the cause, it's tough to get knocked out during elims, and when penalty points make the difference between a win and a loss it's only human nature to try to look for some way to overturn the decision.
This seems to be especially true this year (my only comparison is last year, so forgive any naivety), with some fairly subjective rules regarding pyramid contact, inconsequential contact, etc.
During elims in particular, what if the final ruling wasn't given by the head ref alone, but the team/alliance the foul was against? In a regular competition, this would be ridiculous, but in FIRST it isn't just about the win.
The team climbing while the pyramid got bumped (or whatever pretend scenario you want to choose) is probably the best person to ask whether or not the bump was consequential; and if they think the call is unfair as well (or possibly think the penalty should be less severe), then why not give them the opportunity to be gracious about it.
(For qualifiers, I think the proposed system would be too cumbersome and should not be employed)
One major implication of this is that it diverts a good portion of the malice that is normally reserved for the ref making the call to the team that stood behind the call, and put the deciding team in a potentially tough spot. There are plenty of teams that would always take the win, and there would be some cases where a team feels obligated to surrender the win even if they feel the penalty was legitimate; but the teams that step up and surrender the match when the penalty doesn't fit the foul would really make such a system awesome.
Thoughts?
Edit: Please limit the alternative proposals, particularly those that are discussed frequently (debated at length here:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=114802 iirc), I proposed this idea as a way to expand the gracious nature of First in a way that is relevant to the game being a life lesson; rather than being an end-all way to perfect rule enforcement.