Refs on today's Super Bowl

[ajcardfan]

I don't know. You could just as easily argue that good teams are more prone to getting calls because they're better at working the officials or selling calls or being in the right position to avoid infractions as you could your name recognition theory. As Russ mentioned, in college basketball I think Duke (like other top programs) get a lot of calls but I think that has more to do with Coach K brilliantly working the refs and the influence from the Cameron crowd than it does some complicated conspiracy theory to keep Duke in the Top 5.

It's definitely not that. Not in the NFL, the NBA or college ball. I just believe the refs can get a little "star struck" too. Coach K is a great coach, but put him on ASU's bench wearing a Rob Evans mask and he won't consistently get a huge free throw advantage.

 

[LVCARDFREAK]

I know an ACC head football coach who coaches for a perennial middle-of-the-pack or lower school. Before each game, as is customary, he meets witht he officiating crew for about 15-20 minutes so the refs can go over their "style". (It is really just a routine as they all know each other)

Anyway, the only thing the football coach says to the officiating crew is "Remember we CAN play football. I understand FSU or Miami (or whom ever they are playing) are great football teams but please understand that if we do well its because we CAN play football"

Most other coaches will have a list that says "watch for this or what for that" or "#72 plays dirty etc" or whatever. But his point is that he is trying to get them to understand that just b/c we are not the FSU's or Miami's doesnt mean we cant beat them w/o committing penalties.

The point is that it is all human bias. No he doesnt feel that the refs are out to get him, but he does feel that if he has a game full of penalties he wants them to understand it doesnt always have to be 2-1 against his team.

Until teams like the Cardinals shed their losing ways these same human bias will happen. There is no conspiracy unless it is the conspiracy of human nature.

 

[Russ Smith]

I don't know. You could just as easily argue that good teams are more prone to getting calls because they're better at working the officials or selling calls or being in the right position to avoid infractions as you could your name recognition theory. As Russ mentioned, in college basketball I think Duke (like other top programs) get a lot of calls but I think that has more to do with Coach K brilliantly working the refs and the influence from the Cameron crowd than it does some complicated conspiracy theory to keep Duke in the Top 5.

Well yes and no. the point Doug Gottlieb made on ESPN was he believes Coach k has reached a point at which he gets respect on the road that nobody else gets. That's how he can go into BC and shoot 3 times as many FT's as BC does, in a close game, and come away with the win. That's how his bigman can shoot 16 FTs' while BC's gets 0 attempts and fouls out of the game with 3 minutes left having played the whole game in foul trouble.

I just think some refs get too caught up in reputations, they see Shelden Williams, say he's a great shotblocker, so that was probably a clean block, instead of just watching the play and saying "well the shooter is went flying to the floor, I heard a loud smack, and the entire crowd is going nuts, I'm guessing Williams fouled him."

Same thing in football, looks like someone is going to get a sack, he doesn't, so they assume he must have been held.

 

[MigratingOsprey]

from espn

1) What grade would you give referee Bill Leavy's officiating crew for Super Bowl XL?


46.8% F

26.4% D

15.2% C

9.7% B

1.9% A


2) How do you rate the overall state of officiating in the NFL?


35.6% Average

30.9% Bad

21.0% Good

10.6% Abysmal

1.9% Excellent


3) Did the officiating in Sunday's game unfairly favor one team?


78.1% Unfairly favored the Steelers

17.0% The right calls were made

4.9% Unfairly favored the Seahawks


4) Which played the biggest role in determining the outcome of the game?


54.8% Officials missing calls

30.7% Seahawks not making plays

14.5% Steelers making plays


5) Do you think the official made the right call on Darrell Jackson's offensive pass interference in the endzone, negating a Seattle touchdown in the first quarter?


72.7% No

21.3% Yes

6.0% I'm not sure


6) Do you think the football broke the plane of the goal line on Ben Roethlisberger's touchdown run in the second quarter?


57.1% No

27.5% Yes

15.3% I'm not sure


7) Do you think the official made the right call on Sean Locklear's holding penalty in the fourth quarter, negating an 18-yard reception to the one-yard line by Jerramy Stevens?


73.4% No

15.8% Yes

10.9% I'm not sure


8) Do you feel that you understand what constitutes a ''football move'' on plays involving potential fumbles?


63.0% Yes

37.0% No


9) How much would creating full-time officiating positions, instead of the current part-time positions, help improve the quality of NFL officiating?


44.7% A lot

42.4% A little

12.9% Not at all


10) Which major sport has the best officials?


44.0% MLB

22.6% NHL

20.8% NBA

12.6% NFL


Total Votes: 60,149

 

[clif]

Russ and AJ.. I can see your point about an unintentional bias, but I find it hard to believe that all 6 refs (forget how many there are) would all share the same bias at any given time. We're talking about 7 penalties where 1 is clearly bad.

Even through all this Seattle was still within 4 points in the 4th and got no closer.

 

[Russ Smith]

Russ and AJ.. I can see your point about an unintentional bias, but I find it hard to believe that all 6 refs (forget how many there are) would all share the same bias at any given time. We're talking about 7 penalties where 1 is clearly bad.

Even through all this Seattle was still within 4 points in the 4th and got no closer.

All it really took was one holding call to swing that game.

14-10 Steelers, Seattle on the 1 yard line likely to score and take a 3 point lead, holding, ball comes back. 3 plays later Taylor intercepts Hasselbeck, penalty on Hasselbeck, 4 plays later it's 21-10 Steelers after the Randle El TD pass.

I guess all I'm saying is it takes one ref just assuming that the guy must have been held or he would have had the sack, to dramatically alter the game.

I'm not saying the refs gave the game to Pitt, just that the calls weren't even IMHO. And I think a lot of that was simply expectations of what they assume is going to happen.

 

[Stout]

for once?!

are you f'ing kidding me

do you realize that seattle getting screwed over is one of the main reasons instant replay is in effect?!?!

I don't think any team in the league has had as many run ins with officials

from the testeverde helmet call, the fiasco in baltimore, to the refs running into a WR against the rams, to the shockey phantom TD the list is very, very long

I think there is an open warrant for phil luckett in that city

i understand that some of you really don't like the hawks - that fine - just don't talk like this is the first time they've had some crucial calls in big situations go against them

Hey, I'm not denigrating Seattle's troubles with officiating, but it's not even CLOSE to what we've gone through over the years.

 

[kerouac9]

If you make it so that the officials can decide the game, then you've already lost. Sorry, but no use complaining about the officiating when you had your foot on the Steelers' neck for a quarter and a half and only walked away with three points.

Don't want to get the refs involved? Run your MVP or something. Fans that cry about officiating are just losers, and that includes Cardinal fans. You can't put your team's destiny in the hands of the officials.

 

[Southpaw]

Time to remedy the gripes and stripes

February 7, 2006

BY JAY MARIOTTI SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST



DETROIT -- The NFL is so big that Condoleezza Rice wants to be commissioner, knowing it's an impossible gig to screw up. A recent Harris Poll says pro football is more popular than baseball, basketball and auto racing COMBINED, which must shock Jerry (Baseball Is Life) Reinsdorf. More than 141 million folks watched at least part of an unwatchable Super Bowl, advertisers spent $2.5 million for 30-second hits, and the league projects $7 billion in profits when annual network rights fees jump to $3.7 billion next season.

How mighty is the Tagliabue domain? Mick Jagger, who has told the world to get off of his cloud for four decades, didn't even balk when his mike twice was turned down at halftime during sexually charged song junctures.

So why, with staggering power and wealth in the air and so much at stake on Super Bowl Sunday, does the NFL allow low-rent zebras moonlighting from their day jobs to muddle the grandest of all American sports extravaganzas? When a league can create its own television network and try to heal Louisiana, why can't it fix an officiating crisis that grows worse by the year? A nation should be buzzing today about the class of the Pittsburgh Steelers organization, the Disney World retirement of Jerome Bettis, the pressure plays of Hines Ward and the prettiest spiral thrown by a Steelers passer all night, that from the arm of better-be future Bear Antwaan Randle El.

Instead, the refs are dominating talk again for all the wrong reasons, just as they did last month when the league was forced to apologize after Troy Polamalu's interception was wrongly overturned. At the time, a lot of us wondered why Pittsburgh loudmouth Joey Porter wasn't suspended or fined when he said of the controversy, ''I know they wanted Indy to win this game. The whole world loves Peyton Manning, but come on, man, don't take the game away from us. I felt they were cheating us.''

Tagliabue needs to commit

Now we understand why the NFL didn't respond. The league is embarrassed, realizing it has a major mess in its house that only was compounded Sunday evening. At least five calls were debatable, all against the Seattle Seahawks, which has the rain-soaked citizenry of the Pacific Northwest claiming a pro-Pittsburgh conspiracy because the league, ahem, wanted Steelers owner Dan Rooney to win. If this sounds a little kooky, the league deserves what it gets. This is what's called a perception problem, and until Paul Tagliabue commits to improving the overall officiating performance -- how about creating a force of full-time positions that requires year-round seminars and training and involves more younger eyes? -- a sham element will be attached to his kingdom.

''We knew it was going to be tough playing against the Steelers,'' Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren said Monday. ''But I didn't know we were going to have to take on the guys in the striped shirts, too.''

I won't go so far to say the refs lost the game for Seattle. After all the dubious calls, the Seahawks still were in position to win after Kelly Herndon's interception of Little Ben Roethlisberger in the third quarter -- and botched the reprieve with more drops and blunders. Please be careful to separate the whining of Seattle fans and ticked-off gamblers from concerned football purists. But you can understand why the flurry of questionable flags had people thinking dark thoughts. If Jerry Rice had slightly pushed off on a defensive back while catching an early 16-yard touchdown pass, my guess is the foul wouldn't have been flagged. But Darrell Jackson isn't Jerry Rice, and an early 7-0 lead was nullified.

Then came the call that set off sirens everywhere, the Roethlisberger TD plunge that wasn't. Clearly, linebacker D.D. Lewis stopped Little Ben from crossing the plane of the goal line, but referee Bill Leavy -- emerging as the lead villain -- refused to overturn the play only seconds after an ABC graphic listed his percentage of reversals among the league's lowest. How does a guy so notoriously stubborn become the lead referee in a Super Bowl? What didn't he see in his viewfinder what tens of millions of Americans did see? Instant replay is supposed to eliminate human error, as Tagliabue said over the weekend. ''It's perfectly clear that in the overwhelming number of cases, [replay] eliminates mistaken calls,'' Daddy Tags said. ''It gives the officiating crews the ability to see things that they can't see with the human eye in real time.''

Unless a ref sees what he wants to see, a conspiracy theorist would say. Or unless the league sees what it wants to see, the Seahawks might say. Maybe the Steelers would have scored anyway had the play been reversed, but who knows for sure?

I can't say I saw Sean Locklear hold anyone in the fourth quarter, which eliminated a completion to the embattled Jerramy Stevens to the Pittsburgh 1. On the play when Locklear allegedly held, some Seahawks thought Pittsburgh had lined up offside.

No one in Seattle can groan too much when the Seahawks allowed Willie Parker's 75-yard scoring run, Randle El's gadget-play touchdown pass and Roethlisberger's 37-yard pass to Ward that set up a touchdown. In a dreadful Super Bowl, the team that made the biggest plays deserved to win, lame calls and all. But who could ignore a personal-foul flag against Hasselbeck for tackling Ike Taylor low as he returned an interception? If that tackle was illegal, so were 1,000 others like it during the season.

A lot wrong with SB XL

When the average fan at home can see what the paid officials can't see, the league should be ashamed enough to devote significant offseason time to these issues. How ridiculous, when Tags and his boys have committed to high tech, that they have no clue how to tweak the system and get it right. They have all the money imaginable, yet they can't do something as simple as installing several men in a booth to help the ref and make replay calls as quickly as the TV announcers do down the hall.

So much was wrong about Sunday. Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw didn't appear for the stirring roll call of Super Bowl MVPs, with Montana reportedly refusing because he wasn't guaranteed enough appearance-fee money. Jagger and the Rolling Stones were predictable in song selection and out of sync in musicianship. Roethlisberger played poorly, yet was scheduled to appear on ''Late Show With David Letterman'' to have his bushy beard cut off -- for money, of course, courtesy of a razor company.

But the officials were the biggest dopes.

''What we want to do is to pick up the paper and read about the game, not the officiating,'' said Mike Pereira, NFL zebra chief. ''We all want to be anonymous.''

What they've become is infamous.

 

[golfcardfan]

Crap Article must be a closet seahawk fan!