Monday Night Football’s onside-kick rule confusion showed how Google can spread misinformation online

For almost as long as the internet has existed, there is a certain rhythm for any curious person with a WiFi connection. You have a question, you Google, you get an answer. But the problem is this week Monday Night Football and the NFL’s onside kick rules show how trustworthy Google can be these days — and how the search giant can help spread misinformation.

This confusion is caused by negative feedback. During periods of decline in MNF Baltimore Ravens and Tampa Bay Buccaneers – one of ESPN’s two games last night – Bucs star receiver Chris Godwin was injured with his team trailing by 10 points. The fans were wondering why such a famous player was on the field when the team lost by two goals with less than one minute left in the game.

“We’re trying to win a football game,” Tampa coach Todd Bowles told reporters. “We’re down 10, we’re trying to get more points, we kick another side kick. It’s done.”

That quote, in part, caused confusion. You see, the NFL overhauled its game before this season and changed, well, everything, including the onside kick rules. Surprise onside kicks have been effectively banned, for example, because the new “dynamic” game requires the kicking team to tell the players that they are attempting an offside kick. Amidst all these changes — and the NFL’s eagerness to make the rules more difficult — it’s safe to say that confusion can arise.

Worse, at one point there was a proposed change that would limit how many onside kicks a team could attempt. The law was not accepted – teams trailing can attempt unlimited kicks in the fourth quarter – but it appears in the title Sports News that was eventually fixed. But many people on the Internet were under the false impression that, in fact, the Bucs used their onside kicking power and left Godwin out of the game anyway.

Recap: Viewers thought the Buckeyes were risking the life of a legendary player in a hopeless situation, all because by mistake they believe that teams have a limited number of attempts to find and. In fact, NFL rules allow the Buckeyes to continue to attempt late game kicks aimed at regaining possession of the ball. None of this is easy to understand, but it looks like Google may have made things worse.

The Tweet may have been deleted

The Tweet may have been deleted

The Tweet may have been deleted

The Tweet may have been deleted

In fact, Google may be to blame for all the confusion among viewers. For some reason, a Google search on Monday night turned up some erroneous information. After seeing the confusion while watching the game, I looked up the rules for myself. Google posted a recorded response at the top of the search, with a corrected quote Sports News article, which incorrectly stated that the team was limited to two offside kicks per game. It is not clear exactly when, Sports News has done its own repairs, so it’s possible that Google is slow in finding the repairs made by the store. But Google showed me an answer that is no longer in the article itself.

But Google’s AI-powered search — a very controversial feature — also fared poorly. Its AI overview told me that an NFL team is limited to one onside kick per game. It’s probably funny that you not only keep the wrong information, but make it wrong with two different wrong answers – even if it seems that the overview of the AI ​​is different for some users.

Mashable has reached out to Google for comment and will update the story if we hear back.

An erroneous result from a Google search.
Credit: Screenshot: Google

Credit: Screenshot: Google

Although this situation is very low, it is a frightening picture of how quickly false information spreads on the Internet – especially with the help of Google. Things are moving fast. It’s not just random people who stumble. For example, a respected sports publication like Awful Announcing shared incorrect information, which would have confused many scrollers.

Credit: Screenshot: X

It’s not hard to imagine someone using Awful Announcing’s X account doing a quick Google, finding false information, and posting it. Eventually the Bad Announcement post was corrected – and so were the Google results – but the misinformation spread.

Veteran NFL reporters and the guy who invented a new form of kicking have been messing around.

The Tweet may have been deleted

Granted, it doesn’t help that the NFL has a very complicated rulebook approach. That opens the way for human error to make its way into Google’s results.

But do you know what else is complicated and prone to human error and fabrication? Politics. International conflict. Climate change. What happens when the usual muscle memory of Googling can no longer be trusted?

As Mashable has covered in detail, Google search has experienced a lot of problems lately. The Internet is full of low-quality content that aims to answer common search queries. Court documents and reporting have suggested that Google may have become more focused on ad dollars than reliable search results. And, let’s not forget, the release of the AI ​​search overview received a critical response from the public. Overall, it makes sense that people should double check anything they Google.

So yeah, the rules of the NFL game don’t matter much in the grand scheme of things. But the luxury of bad information that can spread through Google is far greater than anything that happened between the Bucs and Ravens.