FIDE tournaments have markedly different rules than USCF tournaments, especially in blitz chess. I saw a game in a grandmaster tournament where a player with a lone bishop was awarded a win because his opponents surplus material could be configured to helpmate.
A more egregious example I saw was a game in which a former world champion clearly released a piece on a losing square and then moved it to a better one. The commentators noted this was allowed under FIDE rules because hitting the clock completed the move.
This foolishness has trickled down to places where I play informally. I saw a player claim a game on time because his opponent did not press the clock after delivering checkmate.
I would think tournament rules would conform to the actual rules of chess. I also hope that USCF tournaments maintain their clear set of blitz rules and not follow FIDE. Also, if FIDE rules are used, I hope the biggest differences are clearly pointed out. I would not play in an event where the manufactured mate is allowed but might hold my nose at clock move.
Touch move applies in FIDE blitz, and did so long before US Chess saw fit to get rid of the abomination that is clock move.
It is true that an illegal move may be corrected (within the constraints of the touch move rule) before the clock is punched without penalty. This is the case in both FIDE and US Chess rule sets.
The player in question did move the piece he touched. My issue was that he released the piece and then picked it back up after seeing that his blunder would lose on the spot. Please read carefully before spouting useless pejorative comments. Edit: I did not read your comment carefully enough. I agree that clock move is an abomination and I hope it stays far from USCF chess.
Hitting the clock does, in fact, complete the move. However, the move is determined with no possibility of change once the piece has been released on a legal square. If as Mr. Stokes states a player did release a piece on a legal square and then picked it back up and changed his move, then the competition was not governed by FIDE Blitz rules.
You are free to dislike the concept of clock move in blitz as opposed to touch move, but I would venture that the vast majority of blitz games are played under clock move. If you play a lot of blitz under clock move you will have to re-orient yourself a bit when you then play a tournament under touch move, but with that small caveat I don’t consider one set of rules better for blitz than the other. They’re just different.
The same is true of US Chess’s and FIDE’s differing interpretation of what constitutes mating material. US Chess says that a position must be possible wherein mate in one can be forced. FIDE says only that a mate must be possible. Philosophically US Chess puts greater weight on the position on the board, while FIDE puts greater weight on the clock. If you run out of time you are more likely to be given a loss instead of a draw if the competition is governed by FIDE rules rather than by US Chess rules. I have a personal preference for the US Chess philosophy here, but both sets of rules are logical.
You still appear to assert that clock move is the FIDE rule. It is not.
In the situation you describe, one of two things happened:
The player made a legal move with the piece touched, retracted and changed it before hitting the clock. If this happened, the arbiter got it wrong, and the commentators did too.
The player made an illegal move with the piece touched, and corrected the illegal move before hitting the clock. If this happened, the arbiter got it right, and the commentators did too. Furthermore, this is the right course of action under both FIDE and US Chess rules.
Not in rated tournaments, unless gazillions of TDs are willfully running blitz events in total contempt of both FIDE and USCF rules.
If players decide to play informal games clock-move, that’s their problem. If players would insist on touch-move even in informal blitz (or non-rated blitz), there would not be a problem with re-orientation.
And if a non-rated blitz event uses clock-move, players should stay away.
In rated Blitz tournament play you are correct, but what percentage of blitz games are played in rated tournaments? I would guess less than 1%. I’ve played and witnessed thousands of casual blitz games over the decades, and the overwhelming majority of fun blitz games have been played as clock move. Most people want it that way. YMMV.