Looking for irrefutable evidence of a judgement call would lead to a lot of ambiguity and fan anger. Sometimes you would get legit overturns “oh, turns out that defender didn’t touch the receiver after all”, but most of the time you’d end up in a situation where you’d say “it’s kind of weak, but I can see calling that penalty there, no irrefutable evidence otherwise…”
I disagree with the irrefutable evidence bit anyway. Look at it closer and make the best call. Or just get rid of the refs and let the players sort it out. As it is now, the refs decide too many games.
How silly. Next you’ll be saying that no penalties should ever be called.
Do you even know the history behind how the “referee” ended up on the field in football? You might look that up before opining on the subject.
You simply cannot expect every play to be called 100% accurately when the wording of the rules includes language that can be interpreted. One man’s “intentional” is another man’s “accidental” based upon exactly the same view of exactly the same behavior. If you review penalties, then all you do is substitute the judgment of the person doing the review for the person who saw the play in context. Either way, the determination will have an effect upon the result of the game. And meanwhile, while every play is reviewed down to the minutest detail to see what really happened, the players all stand around between each play, and the fans do what, exactly, while the game takes six hours to play? :rolleyes:
Yes, yes, it’s all subjective, etc., etc. Game after game, though, it’s hard to believe the refs are even doing the best they can. Not when they call a PI on one play where the defender didn’t even make contact, then watch a player get impregnated a few plays later without throwing a flag. Not when they throw eighteen flags on a third and long, then get together for a long chat to decide what the flag is for, as if they decided one team needed help first and are casting about for explanations later. Not when they review a play with irrefutable evidence that they made a bad call, and let it stand. And the NFL can’t be serious about fixing the problem when they introduce instant replay but exempt the single biggest problem, which is not ball placement or determining possession or fumbles, but the inconsistent leveraging of penalties. So either get the penalties right, or ease back on them until you can get it right.
Wow, was that a pathetic half of football for the Redskins. They had absolutely no clue. I’ve been a Redskin fan for all my life. I think Billy Kilmer, John Riggins, and Charley Taylor could have done better on offense. And they are each at least 60.
That “field goal” attempt was the greatest worst play I think I have ever seen.
Wow, the Giants just got away with one big time on that scrum. Brandon Jacobs should have gotten a personal foul flag and ejected from the game, IMO. He blatantly throws a punch for no reason. Instead, Haynesworth gets the foul, Giants keep the ball, then score in two plays. Terrible officiating.
Not that the Redskins had a chance at all in this game, I just hate it when a blatant asshole move like that not only gets missed, but ends up benefiting the team. :rolleyes:
Drink extra beers?
How, dear sir, can a beer ever be “extra”? 
Your rant is childish and silly. To assume that the officials aren’t doing the best they can is nothing more than sheer stubborn refusal to accept facts. It also shows that you’ve never officiated a sporting event at anything like a high level (I have, I’ve officiated professional soccer, so I’m aware of what I am discussing). You are doing nothing but whining about something for no other reason than the fact that at certain times, you disagree with the calls being made when they have an impact upon the team(s) you root for; you might as well join the whiny Steeler fans who insist that Harrison is held on every play.
In matter of fact, there are generally two reasons why officials can make mistakes. First of all, the game happens only at one speed for them: now speed. They don’t get to make their mind up based upon luxurious review of multiple angles; they get one shot at it happening fast. It is no wonder that, under the circumstances, slow motion replay with high definition cameras can spot things they didn’t at the time. But unless you want to replay every freakin’ play of the game, from every angle, involving every possible player who had an impact upon the result of the play, there’s not much you can do about that.
Second of all, despite your bland confidence about spotting fouls (or the lack thereof) with the assistance of replay, since many of the fouls in the book involve some sort of “judgment” on the part of the officials, you will NEVER get agreement on what should be called, even when all parties are offered the opportunity to see the same slo-mo replays. I am quite certain that, even if we had hi-def cameras all over the Immaculate Reception, Raiders fans would be convinced they were jobbed, and Steelers fans would be convinced that the call was exactly correct as made on the field. So no amount of review will EVER eliminate your unhappiness with “bad” calls, because you will always see things based upon your biases.
I remember a great example of this at a seminar I was attending back in my attorney days. Right near the beginning of the seminar, someone came in and stole a purse that was sitting on the dais right near the end of the speakers’ table. He then ran out of the room. Someone screamed about the purse being snatched, everyone looked to see what was going on. Despite most of the room having a clear view of the guy as he left, there was absolutely NO concensus on even the most basic details of the event (color of hair, skin, eyes, clothes, purse, etc.). It was, of course, a staged event, designed to show us attorneys that witnesses are not the best evidence providers, because what we see is subjective. This fact is amply demonstrated in every sports bar every Sunday of NFL season.
As for not calling the fouls, that would simply lead to chaos, as I’m sure you really are aware. At least, I hope you are.
Right, and this particular hold is egregious. It was plainly visible in the three-quarter shot, and Fox also chose to come back with an isolation replay of it after the commercial break. It’s troubling because of its frequency against James Harrison.
Note that I am not claiming that James Harrison is held on every play.
I agree. They must be seeing it.
James Harrison stated that when the officials visited the Steelers training camp, he specifically asked about this type of hold. He claims he was told that it was illegal and that it should be called. He also claims that he has had officials tell him in-game that they would have called it if he had been close to the QB. Of course, the illogic of that is obvious.
Is there any way that you can imagine that restraining a rusher, whose entire body is past you, solely by your arm wrapped around his neck, should not be considered holding? I have said, in the past, that offensive linemen may be particularly susceptible to doing this against Harrison because they tend to be quite a bit taller than he is.
Didn’t anyone here watch the Packers at the Steelers on Sunday? What did you think of the replay? Wasn’t it very clear to you? Should that be called holding? If it regularly happens to Harrison and is not called, don’t you think he has valid concern?
Perhaps. I have heard that they routinely send a video package to league offices. Sort of a highlight reel, if you will, of non-called holding against James Harrison.
Shouldn’t the stat be that holding calls for Steelers’ opponents are down? Particularly, the stats for offensive tackles playing against the Steelers?
So, speaking of holding, was I the only one who watched the first quarter last night and wondered whether the NFL had legalized holding for the whole league, just Monday night games, or just the Giants?
Didn’t see the play in question, and probably never will. But the thing with holding is how the hands got there, not just the fact that they are.
For example, I can picture very easily how it wouldn’t be a hold. With a typical rip move, you punch your outside arm inside the block and rip it up, and push your hips through the inside of the blocker. The end result is your are past the blocker’s inside hip with his arms extend out across your head/neck. But at that point, it isn’t a hold if the lineman works to get his hands back inside the body.
Same concept when a defender turns his back on the blocker. It’s not a block in the back because the defender initiated it.
It seems to me, that if you seem to think there is piles and piles of video evidence of holding, and the refs still aren’t calling it, that maybe you don’t understand exactly the rules about holding or that maybe James Harrison actively tries to draw holding penalties by play acting and the refs see right through it, kinda like those wimpy punters who fall down whenever anybody gets within 5 yards of them.
Yep, I watched it. It sure looked like holding to me on that play. The hold kept Harrison away from Rodgers just long enough for him to get off the deep ball to Jennings. IMO, there should have been a flag on that play.
That said, I think the whole “Harrison is held more than others” theory is homerism, pure and simple. (I saw at least two other holds on Sunday that I thought should have been flagged, neither of them within 500 miles of James Harrison. Shit happens.)
Yes, of course. That’s a huge “if”, though, and nobody has ever presented any kind of compelling case that he is held like in Sunday’s highight on a regular basis. I agree with Shadowfacts that it’s nothing more than pure homerism on the part of Steelers fans.
I know that I’ve pointed this out before, but Dan Dierdorf stated his opinion that Harrison is held more than any other defender in the league. Opinion varies as to Dierdorf’s opinion, but clearly he is neither a Steeler homer or fan. He is also one who would know what holding by an offensive lineman is.
What I’m talking about arises because Harrison is very quick to get around the OT, whose last option is to leave his outside arm around Harrison’s neck and restrain him from behind that way.
It’s certainly possible that this happens a lot to other pass rushers in games I’m not watching. All I can say is that it happens routinely to Harrison, is not often called, has a big impact on games, and has been enough of an ongoing concern that Harrison, the league and others (mostly biased fans, to be sure) have made an issue of it.
Again, while I’m not privvy to a bevvy of Harrison plays (though the Steelers do have a large fan base here in the Carolinas), I can only say that, if you think something illegal is happening regularly, but it’s not being called, there should be a re-evaluation of your assumptions about the situation. After all, here are your two possible conclusions:
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The league knows about it, and lets it happen.
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The leauge knows about it, and knows it’s not really holding.
Of the two, which do you consider the more likely scenario? <shrug>
Here, by the way, is an article from last year, asking if the league in general was simply limiting enforcement of the offensive holding call to cases where the hold had a material impact on the play. So it may be that Harrison is being held regularly, but that the league has decided that holding is only going to be called if/when it is deemed to have had a material effect upon the play. In which case, the “hold” the other night might be something one can complain about on the basis that what they missed was not the “hold”, but the apparent effect it had on the play.
Or, it could be that they’ve redefined the foul in some other way to limit its application. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, there is holding on every play in the NFL. If it was called every time it happened, the game would take forever.
You want holding, watch the last play of the Steeler Packers game where Hartwig grabs himself a big ole handful of Johnny Jolly’s jersey, delaying him from getting in Rothlisberger’s face.
The video. The holding starts at about 15 and gets worse for a few seconds.
Clearly holding. Whether or not it was enough to stop Jolly from pressuring Ben is certainly debatable, but, then again, you don’t see a whole lot of Packer fans here bitching about it. I’m beginning to think that Jolly gets held on every single play, but the NFL won’t do anything about the clearly biased refs not calling it. 