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No consensus reached by competition committee on changing NFL replay

Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images Sport / Getty

After two days of discussion about replay review in the NFL, the league's competition committee failed to reach a consensus about whether to change the process, several members told ESPN's Kevin Seifert on Tuesday.

The push to overhaul the current system stems from the NFC Championship Game no-call when Los Angeles Rams cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman blatantly contacted New Orleans Saints wide receiver Tommylee Lewis prior to the arrival of a pass.

However, the controversy apparently didn't spark any fresh ideas, as the committee re-examined previously rejected proposals such as adding an eighth official to each game's crew.

"We've had these conversations," Dallas Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones said. "And you start rehashing them, and you go, 'Oh my gosh, we've had this conversation again and again and again and again and again.'"

There is "very little" support to make significant changes, a source on the committee told Yahoo Sports' Charles Robinson.

Committee chairman Rich McKay said a consensus might not happen until the owners meet from March 24 to 27, and added that any changes would most likely be "tweaks" to allow more freedom to correct obvious errors.

McKay acknowledged the NFL needs to re-evaluate its processes after the conference championship game, but he stressed that doing so is a complex undertaking with a wide variety of factors to consider.

"Given the significance of the play, and the focus on that error late in the game, you need to have a top-down discussion again," McKay said. "I think that's the right thing to do. When you have it, you may come up with some ideas to modify replay, add to, subtract from, whatever it may be. I think that's a healthy discussion.

"And also, I think you're going to have some people who have historically wanted to expand replay and want to use this moment to have that discussion, which I don't blame them for wanting to do. For any discussion about it, you have to go all the way through, meaning end to end, because there are so many complications to it, in the way it impacts the game, officiating, time of game, pace of game, all those things. We are going to do that."

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