Contextualizing Replay: Remediation, Affective Economies, Ontological Authority, and the Facade of Certitude Ray Gamache University of Maryland This study contextualizes replay within the discourse of sport media. Drawing on discourse as theory, the author articulates how replay functions within the sportscast as adjudication, arguably the most compelling yet contentious aspect of the live sportscast. Not only does replay function within sport media discourse, but it also operates within a broader cultural context. Given sport media’s key locus within the entertainment industry, the use of replay is a key technological innovation that has brought even more consolidation and coordination between sport media and the sport leagues and organizations. Replay is media’s contribution to maintaining the veneer of integrity through a quest for certitude. As an analytical strategy, the intertextuality of replay provides an opportunity to interrogate whose interests are being served and consolidated in the mobilization of this technology within affective economies that satisfy a neoliberal sensibility. Pitana’s Dance In the first half of 2018 FIFA World Cup final match between France and Croatia, referee Néstor Pitana drew a rectangle with his hands signaling for replay, after having been alerted via headset from the video assistant referee (VAR), who is, with the assistant VAR, the video match officials charged with advising the match referee. In the moments leading to Pitana’s decision to invoke replay, several French players pointed to Croatian winger Ivan Perisic, who had appeared to have touched the ball with his hand in the penalty area deflecting it out of play. Given this momentary break, Pitana did not immediately acknowledge an infraction and seemed instead to call for a corner kick despite French players signaling for a handball. A handball infraction in the penalty area may result in a penalty kick, if the handball is ruled to be deliberate, so the call was crucial. Did the defender deliberately move his hand or was he hit on the hand with an “unexpected ball” from a point- blank shot with little distance between opponents (“Laws of the Game,” 2018/2019, p. 102)? By invoking replay, Pitana chose to utilize VAR protocol to make his decision, marking the first time VAR would be utilized in a World Cup final match. Coincidentally, Pitana had invoked replay for the very first time in a World Cup match during the opening match of 2018 between host Russia and Saudi Arabia. The referee can use technology to determine a decision only if one of two eventualities occurred (a) a clear and obvious error and (b) serious missed incident. Here was an application of replay to determine whether a penalty had occurred, the visual evidence slowed down to be crystal clear. Pitana followed recommended protocol by first waving off French players, who should not attempt to influence or interfere with the review process, and then by drawing the rectangle symbol- izing a television (“Laws of the Game,” 2018/2019). After several minutes and reviews of two different replays at the monitor, Pitana communicated his final decision by pointing decisively to the penalty box. For Pitana, replay provided the answer about whether a handball had occurred; the ball had definitely hit Perisic’s hand. As to whether the hand had moved toward the ball, which, according to the rule, makes it deliberate, the video evidence showed movement, which Pitana deemed intentional. After the successful penalty kick, France held a 2-1 lead, both goals indirectly the result of referee decisions. At halftime, BBC commentator Alan Shearer decried the “ridiculous decision” (Dore, 2018) that ultimately turned the match into a foregone conclusion for France when it scored two quick goals in the second half. The reviews from sportscasters, analysts, and especially fans of the Croatian side were quite clear; Pitana, the former actor, was panned as inept, and VAR failed in FIFA’s most important game, reigniting debate regarding its use. Not surprisingly, at its annual general meeting in March 2019, the International Football Association Board (IFAB) proposed changes “to provide a more precise and detailed definition for what constitutes handball, in particular with regard to the occasions when a nondeliberate/ accidental handball will be penalized” (“133rd Annual General Meeting,” 2019). Replay is supposed to provide visual representa- tion to explain written rules, which are necessarily subject to interpretation. Pitana’s dash to the sideline and dance in the review area set in motion a discursive chain that connects ontological authority and the pursuit of transparency, certitude, and integrity with a set of communicative logics articulated in today’s high- definition sport media commercial complex (Altheide, 2013; Bérubé, 2008; Messner, 2002). Replay, unfortunately, is no panacea for solving vexing questions regarding player intent, regardless of the technology’s specificity in showing clear images. The purpose of this study is to contextualize replay within the discourse of sport media. Drawing on intertextuality as an analyti- cal strategy (Birrell, 2007), the study articulates how replay func- tions within the sportscast as part of the process of sport adjudication, a specialized discourse that constitutes arguably the most compelling yet contentious aspect of the live sportscast. Considerable scholarship has explicated how replay impacts per- ceptual-cognitive functions, how technologies have been used to enhance sport presentations, and how scientificity and rationality were applied to analytics to change athletic training and speciali- zation. Far less has been done to contextualize replay as constituted by and constitutive of sport media discourse, due in part to its recent Gamache (gamalit52@gmail.com), now retired, received his doctorate in journalism and public communication, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA. 1 Sociology of Sport Journal, (Ahead of Print) https://doi.org/10.1123/ssj.2019-0070 © 2020 Human Kinetics, Inc. ARTICLE