Saints' Sean Payton Talks NFL Adding LED Goalposts and More Technology to Games

New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton thinks the NFL isn't far away from implementing more advanced technology into games that will make officials' jobs easier. 

Speaking to The Athletic's Jeff Duncan, Payton said the technology is available now for the league to use things like LED goalposts for field goals and ball-tracking technology to determine if a ball crosses the plane for a touchdown. 

"It's coming," he added. 

Duncan noted the NFL has been using a Zebra chip in footballs during games for the past three seasons "to gauge the height, velocity, rotation and distance traveled of every pass and kick in every game" to provide information for Next Gen Stats. 

John Pollard, the vice president of product development at Zebra, told Duncan that the chip currently has an accuracy rate within six inches for ball location on the field. 

Payton explained why that level of accuracy can be more effective than relying solely on the referees' judgement in certain instances.

"You punt the ball out of bounds and it exits the field 20 yards in the air out of bounds, (and) the side judge walks up (from) 40 yards away and says, 'Right there.' We now have the ability to, within a foot, tell you where the ball went out of bounds on the sideline," the Saints coach said. 

The NFL has adopted more technology as its become available in recent years, including improved angles on replay reviews, electronic playbooks for in-game analysis by coaching staffs and increased data availability to better evaluate player performance. 

Payton is a member of the NFL's competition committee and will likely be keeping a close eye on the continued improvements with the Zebra chip to improve the officiating of games.