NFL 2014 Season Wildcard Weekend Picks
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  | Scott - No, I did not change your screen saver settings 01/02/2015 @ 09:19:33 AM |
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For the conspiracy theorists out there, Suh's double-step action that was reduced from a suspension to a fine based on the new collective bargaining agreement that wipes a player's "repeat offender" status clean after 32 games (regular season + playoffs + 2 preseason games) occurred on the very first game in which his status was indeed made clean, and per the new agreement a player has to be specifically informed when his slate is indeed made clean. In other words, Suh (Mr. apparently trying to clean up his image) would have known that anything he did would have been viewed through the lens of "first time offender". Also to Jeremy's point about if it was any other player: it wasn't any other player. If Tim Tebow is playing today and steps on a player like that nobody thinks anything of it because Tim Tebow has never done anything in his life that might make you think he was trying to inflict injury on an opponent. Suh, on the other hand, was suspeneded a couple years ago for actually trying to cleat-stomp a guy in the neck, among other things. I know Jeremy addressed this lack of the benefit of the doubt issue, but that really is the only issue in my opinion. How do you give a guy the benefit of the doubt who has a long history and trying to injure other players in non-football ways who steps on and applies all of his weight twice and then pushes off on the exact leg of a QB who was earlier in that game carted off the field because of an injury to that exact spot of his leg? Sorry, with someone like Suh, I think the burden is on him to prove that it wasn't intentional, not on me or the league to prove it was. Although, I'm sure his feet were just really cold. That being said, I think the Lions have a better chance of beating Dallas with Suh, and I think the Lions might have the best chance to go into Seattle and knock off the Seahawks, so from a "how does this affect the Packers" point of view, the reinstatement of Suh seems like if anything might have a positive impact on the Packers. |
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/02/2015 @ 09:29:18 AM |
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| The other thing about Suh is that it isn't accurate to state that he won his appeal. The appeal decision clearly stated that it agreed that Suh's actions were terrible. But based on the collective bargaining agreement's "repeat offender" thing and the fact that week 17 is apparently fair game to do anything on the football field if you are a playoff team because suspending someone might hurt ratings or make fans upset, the sentence was reduced. So depending on how far the Lions go in the playoffs, the next time Suh can stomp a guy in the neck, or step on an injured ankle, or kick a guy in the nuts could be as early as week 16 of 2016. I don't envy the team that has him on their schedule whatever week that happens to be. |
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| Scott - On your mark...get set...Terrible! 01/02/2015 @ 09:37:26 AM |
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| Also, the other side of the "if it were any other player" argument is this: any other player probably looks down to see what he stepped on and then if it was a complete accident probably at the very least says "sorry, man" or helps his opponent up off the ground. Suh never acknowledged that it even happened, and as I heard someone say about it, he didn't look because he KNEW exactly who and what he was stepping on. |
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  | Jon - 1 bajillion posts 01/03/2015 @ 03:56:20 AM |
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Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 09:19:33 AM ...That being said, I think the Lions have a better chance of beating Dallas with Suh, and I think the Lions might have the best chance to go into Seattle and knock off the Seahawks, so from a "how does this affect the Packers" point of view, the reinstatement of Suh seems like if anything might have a positive impact on the Packers. Just because it will make it even more regrettable when this all comes true, I'm now going to tell you how ludicrous it is to think the Lions have anything other than a 0*% chance of beating the Cowboys and then the Seahawks. Do you know how many times Matt Stafford has gone on the road and beaten a team that finishes the year with a winning record? Zero. In his career. Even if you throw in home games, the Lions apparently only have 3 wins against such teams in the games he starts over his whole career. (One being against the Packers earlier this year.) A cherry picked stat, of course, at least to a point, but when you watch the Lions and you hear that stat, it all makes sense. So even though you only said the Lions have "the best chance" to accomplish the feat, I still say false, because that implies that they have any sort of appreciable chance at all. *rounded to the nearest integer. The chance is, in fact, a positive number, but also happens to be best written in scientific notation. This mostly accounts for events such as a Dallas-Seattle double asteroid or some kind of bi-municipal cholera outbreak. source of some info/confirmation of stuff I heard elsewhere: http://sports.yahoo.com/news/lions-qb-matthew-stafford-can-t-dodge-volley-of-criticism-if-he-falters-in-playoffs-051155997.html |
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| Jon messed with this at 01/03/2015 4:06:27 am | ||
 | Jeremy - No one's gay for Moleman 01/03/2015 @ 11:08:04 AM |
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Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 09:37:26 AM Also, the other side of the "if it were any other player" argument is this: any other player probably looks down to see what he stepped on and then if it was a complete accident probably at the very least says "sorry, man" or helps his opponent up off the ground. Suh never acknowledged that it even happened, and as I heard someone say about it, he didn't look because he KNEW exactly who and what he was stepping on. Well, like I said, it was clear he didn't care that it happened, but that's kind of a different question, maybe. As for the "whole weight" thing I really don't see that as that big of a deal. Your last step is almost always your "whole weight", and trying to stop or get off quicker is actually worse. Once he's aboard rocking his weight back and then rocking it forward is actually among as gentle a way to go about it as there is. You want some real damage you have a 350 guy apply double/triple that force to your ankle so he can gain the momentum it takes to jump off and apologize. |
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| Jeremy edited this at 01/03/2015 11:10:49 am | ||
 | Alex - You've got to trust your instinct, and let go of regret 01/03/2015 @ 12:12:56 PM |
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Jon Wrote - Today @ 03:56:20 AM So even though you only said the Lions have "the best chance" to accomplish the feat, I still say false, because that implies that they have any sort of appreciable chance at all. Half way down the page, 6% chance |
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 | Sarah - 4691 Posts 01/03/2015 @ 10:10:41 PM |
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| I don't even know why I bother doing playoff picks, I get them wrong 100% of the time. |
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| Jon - 3463 Posts 01/04/2015 @ 01:25:59 AM |
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Alex Wrote - Yesterday @ 12:12:56 PM Jon Wrote - Yesterday @ 03:56:20 AM So even though you only said the Lions have "the best chance" to accomplish the feat, I still say false, because that implies that they have any sort of appreciable chance at all. Half way down the page, 6% chance false. 0*% chance. |
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 | Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/04/2015 @ 07:10:53 PM |
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Let's talk about the flag pickup heard round the world: While admittedly the late pickup was strange, it probably would have been discussed prior to the call in the first place if these weren't makeshift ref crews. I think I'm the only person in america that didn't think a no call was that big of a deal there. The offensive player was face masking, there was a little contact prior from the defender, but the main contact happened after the defender hit the ball. Also, while he didn't turn around, I always find it odd that the call is "not playing the ball" when the defender literally effects the ball. Pereira says it should have been, and I guess I believe him, but that doesn't necessarily mean it was a slam dunk no brainier call. |
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/04/2015 @ 07:40:58 PM |
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Jeremy Wrote - Today @ 07:10:53 PM I think I'm the only person in america that didn't think a no call was that big of a deal there. Agreed. |
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/04/2015 @ 07:47:01 PM |
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| You agree that I'm the only one, or that a no call wasn't that big of a deal there, weird pickup of the flag after announcing it aside. |
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 | Sarah - 4691 Posts 01/04/2015 @ 08:00:24 PM |
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| We, collectively as America, needed an explanation. No words were given for calling the penalty and then inexplicably picking the flag up therefore we can only conclude, as a group, that JJ paid off the refs in between the announcement and pick up of said flag. |
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| Jeremy - Super Chocolate Bear 01/04/2015 @ 08:01:33 PM |
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| The check definitely cleared after the NFL decided to let Suh play after all. |
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| Jeremy perfected this at 01/04/2015 8:20:07 pm | ||
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| Scott - Resident Tech Support 01/04/2015 @ 08:30:08 PM |
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| Of all the things that defensive backs get called for these days and griped about, that particular play seemed pretty textbook. Regardless of some of the contact being incidental, the DB not only "wasn't playing the ball", he had no idea where the ball was, and in his actions and contact, seemed to make it impossible for the receiver to make any adjustments to come back to the ball. The defender didn't really hit the ball so much as the ball hit him. Generally, when the defender isn't playing the ball--meaning, doesn't seem aware of his surroundings relating to where the ball is--any contact is considered suspect. Seemed to be the case here. |
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 09:53:48 AM |
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After rewatching the play, this is not correct. The defender initiated the contact (with a defensive holding) long before the ball was thrown. The receiver attempted to create some separation from this hold and grabbed the facemask in the process, but the defender still pushed back on the receiver while the ball was in the air, and at no time made any attempt to play the ball or have any idea where the ball was, and in the process made it impossible for the receiver to come back on the ball (which it appears he was trying to do). The fact that the ball hit the defender was to no credit to the defender. So there could have/should have been 2 flags thrown against the defender (holding for the obvious jersey tug, and the pass intereference), possibly 1 penalty on the receiver for facemask (although I see this call passed up 9 times our of 10), and there should have been an automatic 15 yard personal foul penalty on Dez Bryant for storming onto the field with no helmet on to argue with the official. For a defining moment late in a playoff game, this was about the worst example of officiating that you could probably find video on. Where 3, possibly 4 obvious penalties actually occurred, they called 0 penalties, because, in the words of the official's pool report transcript, one of the refs "thought" he saw legal faceguarding. I'm not going to get into conspiracies or anything, but frankly this play specifically is an absolute embarrasment for the NFL and the state of officiating. How can you make so many mistakes in one play where everything was so very obvious, not the least of which was Bryant's helmet-less protest. That's not even a judgement call. The NFL has a lot of explaining to do about the integrity of its officiating after that play. |
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| Scott edited this 3 times, last at 01/05/2015 9:55:46 am | ||
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| Jeremy - 1.21 Gigawatts!?!? 01/05/2015 @ 10:38:13 AM |
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The "coming back to the ball" aspect is also overlooked 9 times out of 10. Once the defense touches the ball any potential pass catcher is fair game, it doesn't matter how they touch it. That's why it's potentially relevant, even if he wasn't "playing the ball". I don't know Dez is relevant to a conversation over whether or not a reasonable person could have seen this play once live and concluded that not enough happened prior to the ball being touched that warranted PI. The problem with all these things is once then happen they get hyper scrutinized. We watch it 200 times in super slow motion and 29 angles and see that yes, perhaps the contact did start .05 seconds before the ball hit the defender, and then we bemoan the idiot who missed that in real time....then we go hunting for more. Holding here, holding there, Dez is on the field, etc etc. How did they miss all these things?!?! The problem with that is it's anomaly hunting. When convenient we ignore the fact that there's something that could be construed holding on every play. We ignore that we have no context for how often players enter the field. We look for things regarding these specific plays and, of course, we find things, because there's something, likely several somethings, to find always. We find them not necessarily because anything particularly questionable happened here, but because they're ubiquitous. We ream the refs for "deciding this game", and all pretend that we wouldn't be decrying them for "deciding the game" if the opposite outcome happened. We ignore every other ref decision in the game because this one happened late The only question is could a reasonable person have seen the PI portion, live and unaided by slow motion and still images, as "the offensive player wasn't making any real attempt to change their momentum back, and no major contact happened until the ball hit the defender" and I think that answer is yes. That doesn't mean it wasn't, if nothing else the extra little shove the defender slipped in there was PI, but this same basic play goes uncalled 10 times a game, these are things that occur in a blink of an eye in realtime, and I loathe the fact that we as a society elevate these calls to worse than they are simply because the time/game was "more important". Especially since 90% of the sportwriters that will gin up the public over this are the same people that think the refs should "swallow their whistles" in moments/games like this in the first place, because of course calling no penalties means the refs "aren't deciding anything." Nonsense. It was a strange situation, and I'll never understand how/why/when the mechanics work of when one ref who did or didn't see anything supersedes another. That doesn't change the fact that IMO a reasonable person could have seen this differently live, and it doesn't belong in the "worst calls HOF" simply because the game/moment was "important" or because the makeshift crew failed to communicate first. |
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| Jeremy perfected this 6 times, last at 01/05/2015 11:07:11 am | ||
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| Scott - Get Up! Get outta here! Gone! 01/05/2015 @ 11:45:15 AM |
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It deserves to be in the "worst calls HOF" because it was a terrible decision and overall a terrible piece of officiating. The fact that it was in a big game, when the refs are supposedly chosen because of how good they were during the regular season, makes it even more inexcusable. This is a statement I would directly challenge, because I think it is pretty much completely false (well, 99% false, based on my scientific conclusion to follow). If there is contact made by a defender when he has his back to the ball and in other ways displays that he is making no attempt to even pretend to know where the ball is, and such action impedes the actions of a receiver who is indeed attempting to catch the ball, I would say this is called 99 times out of 100. And sure I have the benefit of the replay, but this wasn't "did the tip of the ball touch the ground in the middle of a pile when the receiver was going to the ground". That is about as automatic of a call as you get, in my opinion. I'm also consfused about your first statement of that last post. The defender made contact and prevented the receiver from being able to come back to the ball before the ball struck the back of the defender. Are you agreeing with me that this aspect might be relevant? Or are you saying that the ball hit the defender, making the contact legal, and the "coming back to the ball" impedent doesn't matter at that point? Furthermore, regarding the "worst call HOF", the NFL made the decision to make DPI a point of emphasis this season. In my opinion, I'm not actually sure how reasonable it is to look at that play, even in real time, and not immediately think pass interference. Jeremy Wrote - Today @ 10:38:13 AM That doesn't change the fact that IMO a reasonable person could have seen this differently live, and it doesn't belong in the "worst calls HOF" simply because the game/moment was "important" or because the makeshift crew failed to communicate first. I'm going to quote this back to you if and when the Packers benefit from debatable penalty/non-penalty in a supposedly key moment of any future game.  |
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| Scott messed with this 2 times, last at 01/05/2015 11:46:08 am | ||
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 11:57:53 AM |
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In response to the anomoly hunting comment, take my previous comment (from 11:45:15 AM) and read in in context ONLY of the Defensive Pass Interference. I'll concede (for now, although my point was that the entire play seemed like a breakdown of officiating, so I'm intentionally only looking at the play and not all plays in all time) that the holding was slight (although the hold was likely why the receiver made his swipe/facemask to begin with) and that while Dez Bryant's actions might happen 10 times a game, that doesn't change the fact that on one play, 2 players were involved in 2 possibly 3 penalties, and a third player behaved in such a way that couldn't be spelled out much clearer in the rule book by coming onto the field of play without a helmet to chew out the official. So I stand by my greater point that that play specifically was a terrible example of officiating, and could be caused by any number of things: 1) they just screwed up, 2) the NFL decided to rip apart officiating crews to piece together all-star crews who have never worked together, 3) the NFL doesn't care of officials just don't call text book penalties 4) the officials didn't want to give Detroit a first down because a Dallas player on the sideline blew his top, 5) Jerry Jones buzzed down to the officials that he had racy photos of the head ref if the call wasn't picked up, etc. I'm going with 1, with a part of 2 mixed in there. Also, to your point of whether or not a reasonable person can could have seen PI or not PI (in this case non-PI doesn't seem all that reasonable), I also think that a reasonable person could conclude that the refs royally blew a really big call in a really big game and a really big time in that game. A call can be bad by itself while also being bad because of when it happened. This one happens to be both. A bad call in week 1 probably doesn't have the same implications as a bad call in the 4th qtr of a playoff game, even if mechanically both calls are equally erroneous. |
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| Scott edited this 2 times, last at 01/05/2015 12:00:28 pm | ||
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 12:19:02 PM |
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They might have said it was a point of emphasis, but DPI is actually way down this season. Once a ball hits a defender any contact is legal. Since those things happened reasonably close together, fast enough that it's reasonable a human can't discern the difference in one-off real time, I would say that it was reasonable to conclude that the contact was superseded by the touching of the pass. That play gets called plenty, it gets overlooked plenty, but with the added factor that as soon as 1 atom of football touches a defender the receiver is fair game, I think that partially redeems the albeit-wrong-after-all call there. I would be interested to see 100 of these plays where the ball also gets there at for-all-intents-and-purposes-the-same-time, but I'd bet somewhere less than 99 of them are flagged. My point is really just that there is a difference between a "bad" call, and a "reasonable to see what he thought he saw", even if it was wrong, call, and furthermore that we shouldn't lynch the person just because the moment matters more, which sort of implies the position that these refs should gain super human abilities to see things and never be wrong, just because it's the post season, or the end of the game, or that they should not call anything, because the moment is "too important" for them to "get in the way of". (Which with almost no sense of irony most of those same talking heads will be ignoring that they actually got their wish in this case.) As long as you want the games officiated down the stretch, which, unlike some, I do, things like this can and will happen, and need to be put in a broader context. |
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| Jeremy edited this 3 times, last at 01/05/2015 12:36:37 pm | ||
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 12:36:02 PM |
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I don't think I can agree with that, because I disagree with the premise of your argument. I don't think this is the same as "the defender and ball got there at the same time" play. The defender got in the way of the receiver before the ball hit him. This isn't a "bang-bang" kind of play that I am picturing with your description. If it was a case of a defender being aggressive and hitting the receiver at the exact second that the ball got there, then that would be one thing. But that isn't what happened. The defender was in a terrible position the entire route and was making contact with the receiver pretty much the entire play. The ball hit him as the receiver was trying to come back to make the play. In other words "Rule 8 Section 5 Article 2(a): Contact by a player who is not playing the ball that restricts opponent's opportunity to make the catch". That is text book pass intereference. The explanation by the ref in the pool report made no mention of the call being changed because of the ball hitting the receiver. The explanation was simply that someone say legal face guarding. So the "ball hitting the defender" is, in my opinion, not relevant in terms of making the receiver fair game. I'll agree to disagree, since this debate may take a sharp turn south here in a hurry. It seems clear that we both think the call was incorrect. It is the degree of incorrectness that we disagree on. Perhaps we leave it at that. And I stand by my 99% call rate on plays when defenders with their backs to the football impede a receiver from making a move back to the ball. |
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| Scott perfected this at 01/05/2015 12:38:26 pm | ||
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 12:43:10 PM |
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For the record, I'm ok with the explanation for a bad call being "the ref screwed up". Because you are indeed right, the refs are human. But that doesn't change the fact that the ref might have indeed screwed up royally, and it is also entirely possible for the screw up to be unreasonable and to conclude that it was unreasonable. Basically, you are defending the ref by saying "a reasonable person could see it this way", but not allowing someone else to say "a reasonable person could conclude that it wasn't reasonable to call it that way". Frankly, I don't see how it is reasonable to pick up that flag, so put me in that camp. A bad call might indeed just be a bad call. And as long as we are debating "reasonablness", to me, it seems more reasonable that the ref simply screwed up a call than it does that he had sufficient reason to overrule the call on the field. |
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| Scott edited this 2 times, last at 01/05/2015 12:47:46 pm | ||
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| Jeremy - Super Chocolate Bear 01/05/2015 @ 12:47:06 PM |
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At no point is Pettigrew's momentum anything but backwards, or even slowed down. He turned around and held his arms out in the direction of a woefully underthown pass. There is a difference between impeding a receiver and happening to be between a ball and the receiver, and I think it's reasonable to see it as the latter in real time. You are allowed to faceguard in the NFL, and face guarding isn't an issue if the defneder is 5 yards away from the receiver. This is a case where the exception proves the rule. There obviously are cases where a defender is allowed to be close to a receiver, in between him and the ball, and it's not as simple as just straight up as slapping that rule down and saying "see, automatically a penalty". In this case it should have been called because Pettigrew was shoved, not simply because the defender was between him and the ball. The question is then, is is this reasonable to see this as legal face guarding and the eventual "running him over" is moot because the ball hit him. I can see how he saw it that way, and I don't think there's really a whole lot "obvious" about this call, except now that we get to see it was wrong thanks to 200 times in slow motion, which would likely apply to 60 plays from this game alone. We get caught up in evaluating from hindsight too often. It was wrong, but wrong comes in degrees, IMO. |
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| Jeremy messed with this 3 times, last at 01/05/2015 12:55:29 pm | ||
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 12:54:51 PM |
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Making the push for "reasonable" to be the 2015 Meriam-Webster word of the year. I don't see how he saw it in such a way to overturn something a different referee saw (one receiver sees contact, another apparently doesn't and therefore the positive identity of contact is ruled negative?) I do think there is a fair amount of obviousness about this call. The receiver was playing the ball (underthrown or not) while the defender had no clue where the ball was. contact was made by the defender long before the ball nailed him in the back (not nano seconds separated). Like I said, agreeable disagreement. |
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| Jeremy - I hate our freedoms 01/05/2015 @ 01:07:21 PM |
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Well, there's where we might agree. Taken as a whole crew, I don't know where "I didn't see contact" can supersede "I actually saw contact", and I probably never will. One way that makes sense is citing the ball hit him. Maybe the guy got talked out of it because you're allowed to have hands on a guy and distinguishing between that and a shove is sometimes hard, but, I don't know. The contact that warranted PI (the shove before the hands go up) is fractions of a second before the ball gets there even on slow motion, it's an unparseable amount of time live. I don't know what there can be called a "long" time, even by the standards of the usual speed at which things happen. If we can't agree this was "bang bang", live, we won't agree on anything. |
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/05/2015 @ 01:23:49 PM |
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| My problem with referring to it as "bang bang" is because that usually this description usually implies something different (the defender arrived the same time that the ball did, etc). I wouldn't describe this as "bang bang" any more than I would describe a slightly jump-the-gun-offsides defender as "bang bang", although it technically is. You almost always hear bang bang in context of a defender trying to make a play and being over aggressive and hitting the receiver the same time the ball gets to the receiver; and thus you can conclude that a flag could be justified or no flag could be justified because it happened so fast. So while I may concede the point that the primary, PI warranting contact happened right before the ball hit the defender, I wouldn't used the term "bang bang" to describe it. (although there was illegal contact by the defender right from the getgo, so that's why I'm refering to "long before", and any contact by both receiver and defender from that point on, including the final arm shove at the end, was basically both players reacting to the initial contact by the defender. While I see the jersey pull on a receiver not get called all the time, it still is usually bad to not call it) |
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| Scott messed with this at 01/05/2015 1:24:52 pm | ||
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| Jon - 3463 Posts 01/06/2015 @ 01:41:37 AM |
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Hey, haven't read the discussion and don't plan on it. I didn't see the game and didn't see the play until today and just read some of the posts on my limited twitter feed from during the game. I personally think it's not that big of a deal. Even if it "should have" been a penalty, it's not a big deal. Oh, the refs missed a call? That never happens. Obviously I would feel terrible if that went against me so yeah, I'd be talking a different game in that situation. I know that because there have been dozens of calls every year that go against my teams and the calls are proven to be incorrect. It sucks. But it happens. Whatever, this is just the Richard Sherman moment of this year's playoffs maybe. Also, I guess I didn't realize how much hatred of the Cowboys is still so active. (Because, really, I feel like that could be a factor driving a lot of outrage.) Like, people haven't let that go after all these years. Don't get me wrong, I'm not meaning to sound like I'm on my high horse here and telling you that you don't have the right to cheer against anyone you want. I know I cheer against teams and players (though, honestly, I do think it usually brings out the uglier parts of me). I just am honestly surprised that a team that's been a .500 team for the last decade and hadn't even won a playoff game in forever still seems to be hated nationwide. I dunno, maybe I'm not surprised. Maybe I'd feel that way too if I had a reason. Though I'm not entirely sure what the reasons are that people hate them. Maybe it's my anti-anti-Romo bias coming through. And my firm belief that the Lions are garbage and the playoffs are better without them. Thanks for the time, I'll hang up and not listen. |
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/06/2015 @ 08:11:38 AM |
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Jon Wrote - Today @ 01:41:37 AM I just am honestly surprised that a team that's been a .500 team for the last decade and hadn't even won a playoff game in forever still seems to be hated nationwide. I dunno, maybe I'm not surprised. Maybe I'd feel that way too if I had a reason. Though I'm not entirely sure what the reasons are that people hate them. Maybe it's my anti-anti-Romo bias coming through. And my firm belief that the Lions are garbage and the playoffs are better without them. Thanks for the time, I'll hang up and not listen. I know why Packer fans hate the cowboys. But maybe the greater football world hates the Cowboys because of the whole self-titled America's Team moniker that is still used on the team website. |
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/06/2015 @ 10:24:02 AM |
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Jon Wrote - Today @ 01:41:37 AM I just am honestly surprised that a team that's been a .500 team for the last decade and hadn't even won a playoff game in forever still seems to be hated nationwide. As someone said, if the NFL is rigging things so that the Cowboys win, they've been doing a pretty terrible job for 15 years. |
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| Scott - Get Up! Get outta here! Gone! 01/06/2015 @ 11:43:17 AM |
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Jeremy Wrote - Today @ 10:24:02 AM Jon Wrote - Today @ 01:41:37 AM I just am honestly surprised that a team that's been a .500 team for the last decade and hadn't even won a playoff game in forever still seems to be hated nationwide. As someone said, if the NFL is rigging things so that the Cowboys win, they've been doing a pretty terrible job for 15 years. Well, no one ever said that Jerry was good at what he does (like successfully trying to rig things). |
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| Jon - 3463 Posts 01/07/2015 @ 01:38:10 AM |
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Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:11:38 AM Jon Wrote - Yesterday @ 01:41:37 AM I just am honestly surprised that a team that's been a .500 team for the last decade and hadn't even won a playoff game in forever still seems to be hated nationwide. I dunno, maybe I'm not surprised. Maybe I'd feel that way too if I had a reason. Though I'm not entirely sure what the reasons are that people hate them. Maybe it's my anti-anti-Romo bias coming through. And my firm belief that the Lions are garbage and the playoffs are better without them. Thanks for the time, I'll hang up and not listen. I know why Packer fans hate the cowboys. But maybe the greater football world hates the Cowboys because of the whole self-titled America's Team moniker that is still used on the team website. Yeah, if it's one thing we can all agree on, it's that self-important football franchises are the worst. Especially if they self-identify with some grandiose nickname that was coined years ago and isn't technically accurate anymore. Also, prior to this year, the Cowboys were actually the favorite NFL team in America for six straight years as measured by the Harris Poll. So, they're not exactly the local diner brewing up a cup of Folger's and advertising "World's best coffee" in their window. Also, the star on their helmets stands for greatness. *waluigi* *babymario* |
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| Jon perfected this 11 times, last at 01/07/2015 1:48:11 am | ||
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| Scott - No, I did not change your screen saver settings 01/07/2015 @ 08:09:53 AM |
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Having lived outside of Wisconsin for a little while, I can say with some certainty that I rarely came accross someone who had ill feelings towards the Packers. However, the disdain for the Cowboys seems to be akin to the disdain people have for the Yankees (who are also "America's favorite team"), even if it is for different reasons. Despite what the general Viking fan thinks (especially those that live within the walls of Packer Territory) people outside of that shell don't tend to view Packer fans or the Packers with the same level of "those arrogant schmucks". I know some people with no ties whatsoever to the Packers who bought Packer stock this last go-round because they thought it was the coolest thing ever to be able to claim ownership to an NFL team. According to the Harris Poll, the Packers apparently were officially America's team from 2002-2006 then, right? I'm confused why Titletown isn't accurate? Do you know of any other NFL franchises with more NFL Championships than the team that plays it's games in Green Bay? Titletown is emlazened on the great seal of the city of Green Bay afterall. How can that be wrong? Also, is the Packers President as unlikeable as the guy that runs the Cowboys? So to summarize, I think it's accurate that the greater football world hates the Cowboys in part because of the way they ooze their self importance. However, outside of Vikingdom (or bearsdom, or lionsdom--or any rivalry type setting anyway), whatever real self importance the Packers might ooze isn't nearly as hated by the general population as the Cowboys. comment notes: I'm amused that Jon made 11 edits on that last post that only consists of 5 sentences. |
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| Scott messed with this 3 times, last at 01/07/2015 8:13:35 am | ||
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| Scott - 6225 Posts 01/07/2015 @ 09:03:52 AM |
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| For the record, I'm pretty condifent I just lit the fuse to a powder keg with my previous comment. |
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/07/2015 @ 01:09:46 PM |
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 Some teams have spread (Broncos, Vikings), some teams have scattered fans (Steelers), but the Cowboys have both. People hate the Cowboys like they hate the Yankees because they were the best team in a lot of our formative years, not to mention people don't like the fact that there's a huge overlap in Yankee and Cowboy fandom, because both of those teams represent their sport's band wagoners, albeit at this point, loyal ones. "a loss today would make this the worst day for Cowboys fans since Jeter retired." |
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| Jeremy messed with this at 01/07/2015 1:36:38 pm | ||
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| Scott - Ma'am, can you make sure your computer is turned on? 01/07/2015 @ 02:52:32 PM |
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Spread is interesting because it seem that it has more to do with geographic proximity to other fan bases than anything else. For instance, who is New Mexico going to root for if not the Cowboys? The same goes for The Dakotas and the Vikings. The Dakota's aren't Viking fans because the Vikings are such a good team to follow. The Dakota's are Viking terrority (except for the parts that are Packer Territory) because there is no football franchise between St. Paul and Seattle. In fact, the west is interesting in general because it would look like the Broncos, cowboys, Seahawks, and others have bigger fan bases than the rest of the country. While those parts of the country are less populated in general than the east, there are also fewer teams west of the mississippi (11 vs 21 east of it), so there are much more fans per team in relation to the geography. In other words, each team in the western half the country has less competition for fans than teams in the east. In other words, I think Scatterdness says more than spread does. By rough glance, the Packers, Steelers and Broncos own counties in 9 different states, the Cowboys have 15 states. The Broncos counties are all adjacent to each other (except for 2 that I can see), so their fan base too is largely because of geography. The Packers, Steelers, and cowboys on the other hand, have fans dotting all over the country. The biggest reason the Broncos and Vikings and Seahawks and Cowboys have so much spread is because there are no other teams in the geographic vicinity competing for attention. |
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| Scott - Resident Tech Support 01/07/2015 @ 03:21:40 PM |
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Jeremy Wrote - 01/05/2015 @ 10:38:13 AM The problem with all these things is once then happen they get hyper scrutinized. We watch it 200 times in super slow motion and 29 angles and see that yes, perhaps the contact did start .05 seconds before the ball hit the defender. Back to this for a minute. Rewatching the replay in real time, the contact does not happen .05 seconds before teh ball gets there. For starters, the contact "started" about 10-15 yards prior to where the ball hit the defender. But even if the 5 yard jersey tug isn't relevant, the defender also swats away the receivers arms a full 2 seconds before the ball hits him in the back. So I return to my original point that I think it is absurd to think that the ref who claims he saw no contact to then overrule the ref who threw the flag for contact was doing so reasonably. And, having watched it again, totally dismiss the idea of the play and contact being "bang bang". It was more like bang.....wait for it....receiver reaching back.....ball hit his back. So in book, that's the textbook definition of pass interference. I don't think that a reasonable person (in this case, the ref) could have come to that conclusion without having that conclusion considered a terrible call. So in summary: I think sports fans are justified in their rage about that play and call/non-call. It was a pretty bad call, compounded by the impact it had in the game, and compounded by the awful piece of officiating where the call got announced over the speakers, then picked up with no explanation, compounded by the fact that it benefitted the most hated team in football. Bad call, bad officiating mechanics, bad moment for something like that to happen. All in all, an embarrasing moment for the NFL, any which way you slice it. |
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| Scott edited this at 01/07/2015 3:27:35 pm | ||
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/07/2015 @ 06:08:48 PM |
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Scott Wrote - Today @ 02:52:32 PM The biggest reason the Broncos and Vikings and Seahawks and Cowboys have so much spread is because there are no other teams in the geographic vicinity competing for attention. Well, duh. It's just not like that "doesn't count" for some reason. Some teams have "tall" fan bases, some have wide, some have more scatter. Interesting tidbit: the Vikings are the Dakotas' favorite and most hated team. |
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/07/2015 @ 06:25:03 PM |
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Scott Wrote - Today @ 03:21:40 PM Jeremy Wrote - 01/05/2015 @ 10:38:13 AM The problem with all these things is once then happen they get hyper scrutinized. We watch it 200 times in super slow motion and 29 angles and see that yes, perhaps the contact did start .05 seconds before the ball hit the defender. Back to this for a minute. Rewatching the replay in real time, the contact does not happen .05 seconds before teh ball gets there. For starters, the contact "started" about 10-15 yards prior to where the ball hit the defender. But even if the 5 yard jersey tug isn't relevant, the defender also swats away the receivers arms a full 2 seconds before the ball hits him in the back. So I return to my original point that I think it is absurd to think that the ref who claims he saw no contact to then overrule the ref who threw the flag for contact was doing so reasonably. And, having watched it again, totally dismiss the idea of the play and contact being "bang bang". It was more like bang.....wait for it....receiver reaching back.....ball hit his back. So in book, that's the textbook definition of pass interference. I don't think that a reasonable person (in this case, the ref) could have come to that conclusion without having that conclusion considered a terrible call. So in summary: I think sports fans are justified in their rage about that play and call/non-call. It was a pretty bad call, compounded by the impact it had in the game, and compounded by the awful piece of officiating where the call got announced over the speakers, then picked up with no explanation, compounded by the fact that it benefitted the most hated team in football. Bad call, bad officiating mechanics, bad moment for something like that to happen. All in all, an embarrasing moment for the NFL, any which way you slice it. No one is saying they didn't miss holding/illegal contact. As for the PI they missed a shove fractions of a second before the ball gets there. I don't see how we can still be "arguing" this point, it's fractions of a second, factually, and objectively, and a small fraction at that. Shoves themselves are tough to parse, and decide when it was a push even if it was a push, because you're allowed to have hands on a guy. They're not really even together while the ball is in the air until the offensive player puts his hands on the defensive player, and the defensive player brushes the arm away. If this is already PI, and it might be, then the rules need a stern talking to. I'm skeptical that an offensive player is allowed to hold a defender at bay and any attempt at not being held away is defensive PI. The shove of this play is uncalled constantly, there was nothing "oblivious" about it in real time, it was the daintiest of shoves on a player with 100% of his momentum going away from the ball, who was in no position to reverse that momentum, and all separated by half a blink of an eye from the ball getting there, at which point the defender is allowed to all but stab any would be recipients. Let's let it go already. |
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| Jeremy screwed with this at 01/07/2015 6:26:42 pm | ||
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| Jon - Nutcan.com's kitten expert 01/08/2015 @ 02:48:58 AM |
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Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:09:53 AM Having lived outside of Wisconsin for a little while, I can say with some certainty that I rarely came accross someone who had ill feelings towards the Packers. However, the disdain for the Cowboys seems to be akin to the disdain people have for the Yankees (who are also "America's favorite team"), even if it is for different reasons. Despite what the general Viking fan thinks (especially those that live within the walls of Packer Territory) people outside of that shell don't tend to view Packer fans or the Packers with the same level of "those arrogant schmucks". I know some people with no ties whatsoever to the Packers who bought Packer stock this last go-round because they thought it was the coolest thing ever to be able to claim ownership to an NFL team. . . . So to summarize, I think it's accurate that the greater football world hates the Cowboys in part because of the way they ooze their self importance. However, outside of Vikingdom (or bearsdom, or lionsdom--or any rivalry type setting anyway), whatever real self importance the Packers might ooze isn't nearly as hated by the general population as the Cowboys. Not being hated for self-importance isn't grounds for an acquittal of the charge. Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:09:53 AM According to the Harris Poll, the Packers apparently were officially America's team from 2002-2006 then, right? If they had come up with that nickname for various reasons many years prior and then someone questioned it's veracity during those years, the Packers would have a strong case. Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:09:53 AM I'm confused why Titletown isn't accurate? Do you know of any other NFL franchises with more NFL Championships than the team that plays it's games in Green Bay? Titletown is emlazened on the great seal of the city of Green Bay afterall. How can that be wrong? They don't currently have the title, there are many "towns" with more titles, and "America" voted to give another city that name when ESPN gave them the non-scientific chance to state their apparently coveted opinion. Also, because it's symmetry. It's a self-appointed nickname with ambiguous criteria. There will always be reasons it's not accurate and reasons it is. Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:09:53 AM Also, is the Packers President as unlikeable as the guy that runs the Cowboys? Not sure, I've never met either. I have a sneaking suspicion they aren't exactly as portrayed in the media. Are the Packers' "owners" as unlikeable as the Cowboys'? I'd imagine some are. Collectively, almost certainly more so. *diddykong* Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 08:09:53 AM comment notes: I'm amused that Jon made 11 edits on that last post that only consists of 5 sentences. Ha. I figured someone would notice that. My html skills weren't great at their peak. They weren't any better after dusting them off all these years later. It was mostly just format changes though. I think the content was largely and essentially untouched. Also, some of those weren't "edits" at all. Just clicked the edit button and went back without changing anything. Just figured I'd explain myself so you didn't think I cursed you and all packer fans out 10 different times and then finally thought better of it. |
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| Jon messed with this at 01/08/2015 2:52:09 am | ||
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| Jeremy - 9563 Posts 01/08/2015 @ 10:13:02 AM |
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I guess I wasn't the only one, although I disagree that we should "want" to "let them play". http://mmqb.si.com/2015/01/05/nfl-detroit-lions-dallas-cowboys-pass-interference-call/ |
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