“That Sounds Smart to Dumb People”: Marcellus Wiley Dismisses Elle Duncan’s “OT Football Rules Suck” Remark

College football overtime has undergone drastic changes in recent years. Teams used to alternate possessions, then attempt two-point conversions from the third extra period onward after touchdowns. Now, schools must try for a two-point conversion following a touchdown in the second overtime. If the game requires more sessions, they alternate two-point attempts until a winner is decided.

ESPN analyst Elle Duncan torched the overtime adjustments on a recent episode of First Take. Her comments – saying “the rules sucked” – drew the attention of Marcellus Wiley, a 10-year NFL veteran. Wiley, who also used to work for ESPN and FOX, couldn’t have disagreed more with Duncan’s opinion. He blasted her thoughts on his YouTube channel.

“That sounds smart to dumb people. And this is not a shot [at Elle]. Football has never been uniform; it [has] never been even… all three phases [are not] proportionate… it’s never everything [as an even] 33 and one-third percent.”

Wiley took greater issue with some of Duncan’s justifications for her feelings later in the segment. Notably, Duncan’s disdain for alternating two-point conversion tries stemmed from belief that they aren’t “actual football.”

“It’s whoever has the best prowess in the booth. Whoever has the best plays… the best gadgets they can come up with. It has nothing to do with actual football… you eliminate defense. You eliminate field position. All of the things that go into winning a game.”

This quote flabbergasted Wiley. In his mind, the quality of coaching is just as important to the game as the quality of players on the field.

“You can’t minimize coaching. You can’t say, ‘oh, that ain’t real football cause y’all got better plays’… the whole thing of football is moving another man with skill against his will down the field. And you know how you do that? Now with physical force; not fully… you can’t push me 100 yards, but you can make me get out of position. You can manipulate me.”

Between Dec. 23 and Dec. 26, three college football bowl games went to overtime. Two of them went beyond three OT sessions, finishing in five and six frames, respectively. Those periods brought “higher stakes drama”, which is important to the concept of overtime in Wiley’s mind. Victory or defeat truly comes down to one play. In Duncan’s ideal scenario, that’s not the case.

Recent NFL contests show as much. The Cincinnati Bengals, with their playoff lives on the line, missed a game-winning field goal versus the Denver Broncos in Week 17. Instead of Denver having an immediate chance of their own to score, they had to drive down the field. They didn’t do so; the Bengals, given new life, found the end zone on their ensuing possession.

As Wiley alluded to, the circumstances of overtime have never been completely fair. One way or another, someone will have an advantage. But generally speaking, it’s more difficult for college players than NFL professionals to maintain their effectiveness late in a game. Two-point conversions “funnel” the game down, as Wiley put it. And in college, that’s a logical route to follow.