I can heartily agree with this. Most emphatically I must say. The Steelers are the dirtiest team in all of football and have been for some time. But oh noes, Vontaze Burfict! He’s not ours!
*Most notably, wide receiver Hines Ward and linebacker James Harrison have garnered the “dirty label.” The duo annually appear on the outlets’ Dirtiest Player polls, and both have accumulated plenty of highlights that show their work in action.
Ward’s reputation as a dirty player stands out because it has come to almost overshadow his great production. Although some defend Ward’s hits as technically clean, they remain often cheap and unnecessary.
Superstar safety Troy Polamalu has become a media darling, but he too has been voted onto Dirtiest Player polls in the past.*
The “punch” that Jeremy Lane was ejected for was a rather bogus call. It appears that Davante Adams grabbed his facemask without provocation (other than engaging for a block) and was dragging Lane around. The league will probably make some kind of conciliatory statement (I would hope), though it should be qualified by the point that Lane tackled Adams aggressively when he probably should have kept his cool. I do not believe that the ejection was warranted, based on those replays.
I agree that Davante Adams should have been penalized for his clearly illegal action, but it looks to me that, although it wasn’t a “punch”, Lane clearly leads with his elbow into Adams head, and then jams and holds his forearm into Adam’s throat for awhile. To me, that clearly meets the definition of unsportsmanlike conduct. Not that Adams didn’t deserve it, though.
Interesting week 1 so far. The Jaguars and Rams look impressive in getting wins (but serious questions about the horrid QBing of the teams they played against). Young QB’s like Goff, Wentz and Carr outshone Super Bowl champs Eli Manning and Joe Flacco (which really shouldn’t be a surprise). The Pats lose, the Packers win, and we still have a couple games to go tonight.
the good- Patriots lose (even better that they lose at home), Packers show some good defense and resiliency in their win, the Bengals defense is not completely awful without Vontaze Burfict
the bad- the Bengals offense. The pass blocking was atrocious, the scheme was questionable at best, and Dalton was just bad. Punting on 4th down in the 4th quarter down 20, and in opponent’s territory was Lewis conceding the day, but sadly not a surprise from one of the league’s most inept in game coaches. The officiating in both games I watched was questionable at best, with the longtime inconsistency of the group rearing its head once again. And one last one for right now… the same 3-4 testosterone laced truck commercials over and over. Another reason I hate watching network television.
Ah, a fellow Cincinnati sufferer! I can’t really add to what you say, other than Marvin Lewis should have been fired after the playoff loss to San Diego. And Zampese needs to be sent back to the quarterbacks room. And who on Earth ever thought Ogbuehi was going be any better this season than last? He’s TERRIBLE!
“The Niners just might not suck so terribly this season.”
What gave you that optimism? Other than the Bungles they looked the most most inept yesterday.
Does anyone care about how the Stealers continue to get away with illegal hits? They call Vontaze Burfict dirty out of jealousy, he’s not THEIR dirty bully. If he was, there’d be legions of excuses.
Make up your own mind, this is how they play all the time: Bengals LB Vontaze Burfict shares Steelers’ dirty plays on Twitter - Cincy Jungle
I hate when time out on the field goal thing works, because it feeds the idea that it’s somehow advantageous to have your opponent “have to make it twice” (which it doesn’t) - people have confirmation bias so that when it does work out that way, people say it works, but then when it does the opposite - when the first kick would’ve missed but the second kick hits - people forget about it.
They’re moving in the right direction with Lynch and Shanahan. They have to keep Hoyer healthy. If they can do that, and all stay healthy, they should get maybe 5 wins this season. They should be significantly better than last season.
That’s been Buffalo’s problem. The Bills have always have bad seasons but they never have terrible seasons. They’re stuck somewhere in the lower half of the league but they never reach the bottom. As a fan, you almost wish they would get worse so you could hope for some top draft picks.
The ejection looked iffy. There probably should have been offsetting penalties between Lane and Adams, which still would have brought the ball back. There was also the block in the back which again will bring that play back.
The non-call on the pass interference was due to a ball being deemed non-catchable. You may not agree, but the refs called what they saw. I’ll leave you with some quotes from Pete Carroll on the Fail Mary:
*“We had a great celebration on it.”
“That referee was standing right there looking right down at it and he didn’t miss what he saw. He just saw it that Golden Tate made the catch. He wasn’t confused. He called what he saw. Sports are like that.”*
Like Pete says, “Sports are like that.” No sympathy here on a call going against Seattle for a change. They have had more than their fair share of bad calls in their favor the last few years.