# The Abyssmal Super Bowl Officiating **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 6, 2006, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191 "2006-02-06T05:02:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/61 "2006-02-06T20:14:52Z")
And that’s really a shame, ya know, because both teams worked their butts off during the season and neither deserves to have a win either taken away or marginalized by the officiating. ---
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/62 "2006-02-06T20:32:51Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > There was a Jeremy Stevens catch and fumble that was ruled an incomplete pass. Since the fumble rolled out of bounds, it would have been the Seahawks’ ball, so I don’t see how you can call that a call against the Steelers. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/63 "2006-02-06T20:38:05Z")
**Manduck** , the closest player to that ball post fumble was a Steeler and as long as it took it to roll out of bounds, had it not been blown dead I think he’d have had ample opportunity to retrieve it while it was still in play. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/64 "2006-02-06T21:07:19Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > I have to wonder why Ed Hocculi’s team wasn’t given the super bowl. I only know 3 head refs by name - two because they’re horrible, and one because he’s really good. McCauley, Triplet, and Hocculi respectively. That’s true, Triplette is the NFL posterboy for awful ref. So of course they had him ref the Redskins/Bucs playoff game. Don’t they have some decent, or even mediocre, crews out there? There are only four games on any given playoff weekend, right? How about they retire Triplette, maybe give him a medal, and have _anybody_ else call the games? ---
**Author:** ![light\_strand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a6a055/32.png) [@light\_strand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/light_strand)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/65 "2006-02-06T21:11:20Z")
There were definitely a couple of calls that went against Seattle, but the Rothlesberger TD wasn’t one of them. A replay must be absolutely irrefutable for the call to be overturned. I think it’s safe to say that since there are folks arguing this that is was certainly refutable. In fact, if it were called the other way, (no touchdown) then it shouldn’t have been overturned either. The goal line catch was definitely incomplete. The push-off was there. If you looked at the replay, the ref went for the flag immediately, but couldn’t get it out. Then it looked liked he bowed to pressure from the player. Some other calls were questionable, but there are always a ton of bad calls in a football game. You ought to try being a Lions fan; there are games where we don’t have a single call go our way. Learn to live with it. Pittsburgh deserved the win, and Seattle didn’t. How did Seattle make it that far with the terrible clock management? ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Gene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecae2f/32.png) [@Soylent\_Gene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Gene)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/66 "2006-02-06T21:24:03Z")
I think most of us are agreement about the the refs contributing big-time to the outcome of this game. If you still dont beleive that, read this [column](http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=bayless/060205) by Skip Bayless at ESPN…and \*\*he does NOT like the Seahawks \*\* and has made no bones about that in the past. Several others at ESPN are in agreement. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/67 "2006-02-06T21:54:40Z")
Officiating was horrible. Period. Why would ESPN have a poll asking about multiple calls? Why would 75% of the US think the calls were botched? Why would the TV commentators question them during the game? Why would so many people not Steeler or Hawk fans be bitching about it? Why would so many sports writers across the US devote their entire article to the horrible officiating? Why would [ESPN.com](http://ESPN.com) and [Foxsports.com](http://Foxsports.com) have multiple articles about it? Why would the message boards be flooded with people complaining? Right now we simlpy don’t know which team would have won that game if the officiating was decent, and that’s a shame. ---
**Author:** ![Kiros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/439d5e/32.png) [@Kiros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kiros)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/68 "2006-02-06T22:15:22Z")
I think you want to cite the Michael Smith column that’s up on [ESPN.com](http://ESPN.com) right now instead of the Bayless one - since, you know, Smith is a top-of-the-line sports reporter, and Bayless is pretty much a tool 😛 They’re both going for the same point, though. The more I think about this game, the more I tend to think that the obviously bad calls were obviously bad (the block call on Hasselbeck, the later holding call), and that the questionable ones are all extremely justifiable (particularly the offensive interference and the TD call). At the same time, if you made a “Top Ten Worst Reffed Games of the 2006 Playoffs” list, this game doesn’t get higher than 3 or 4. It wasn’t “Seahawks got jobbed” so much as a combination of “reffing a game live is hard” and “a lot of these refs just honestly suck”; this was the culmination of an extremely crappy playoffs for the officiating occupation. Mostly, though, I keep coming back to this: Seattle decided to go retro (which is to say, 2004) when it came to their team receiving, clock management, and game plan skills. They missed two long field goals; difficult kicks made more difficult by the penalty-added distance, sure, but kicks that Brown has been making all year to help them win. They fell for a trick play that anyone who has seen more than one or two Steelers games this year saw coming as soon as Bettis gave the ball to Randle-El. As for why everyone is focusing on the officiating: There’s nothing else about this game WORTH focusing on. The Bettis story was played out a week ago. Ward is an underwhelming MVP choice, a by-default. The winning QB had a 22.6 rating, and the winning defense was sieve-like at best. I’m still not convinced Seattle would have finished above .500 this year if it still played in the AFC West. Both of the guys trash-talking leading up to the game (Stevens and Porter) played like utter crap. The league MVP had a pretty good game, but was anything but MVP-like in his influence upon said game. So, we’re left with “The officiating seemed like it had a moderate bias towards one of the teams, in terms of the calls that were made (though not the intent to make those calls)”. News flash: this is true of probably 80+ percent of NFL games (hell, football games at any level, if not sports in general). If this were a normal NFL game, we’d already be on to our Monday afternoon stories about how great Duke is, when Kobe will have another huge game, and who the Sox or Yankees just signed - but it’s the Super Bowl, they have to write about SOMETHING, and the officiating is the angle du jour. ---
**Author:** ![BlackNGold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@BlackNGold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackNGold)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/69 "2006-02-06T22:17:07Z")
Was the officiating bad? Yes. Were the calls in the Steelers favor? Yes. Did the bad officiating cost the Seahawks the game? No. The only call that I can even contemplate as a game-breaker was the pass interference in the end zone. That was a bad call. Against the rules, but receivers make a career of pushing off like that and it’s almost never called. Hell, right here Plex did that almost every reception. The rest of the bad calls were incidental to the outcome. Pittsburgh made the plays they needed to, Seattle didn’t. I wish there wasn’t some kind of “cloud” over this win, but both teams played kind of poorly. Pittsburgh more than Seattle, but Seattle blew it at bigger moments. Sometimes teams need to win despite bad officiating. Pittsburgh did at Indy, Seattle didn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/70 "2006-02-06T22:23:50Z")
There were only two bad calls against the Seahawks (holding call, cut block call) and one against the Steelers (Stevens fumble). None of them came on touchdowns. The Seahawks lost because they got outplayed. This is a phony controversy. The push-off was absolutely legit. The Roethlisberger touchdown was very close, but after watching it a million times, I’m positive the ball broke the plane (or at least grazed it) before Ben hit the ground. I think it could have been called either way and don’t think the replay would have been conclusive enough to overturn it either way. Even if the call had gone against the Steelers, they would have had fourth and inches to go and they would have scored anyway. The offense never left the field during the review and Roethlisberger never took his helmet off. They were going to go for it regardless and the percentages are pretty high that they would have gotten in. ---
**Author:** ![ZebraShaSha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/eada6e/32.png) [@ZebraShaSha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZebraShaSha)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/71 "2006-02-06T22:41:42Z")
Is anyone going to mention the spotting? It happened multiple times, but the most obvious one is when Ben went for a first down late in the game. He clearly got over the line by a good couple of yards via diving, then they spotted it so close to the line that they had to do that flag thing. That was the most glaring example, but it happened a lot, whether giving or giving. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/72 "2006-02-06T22:48:53Z")
> [@ZebraShaSha](#): > > Is anyone going to mention the spotting? It happened multiple times, but the most obvious one is when Ben went for a first down late in the game. He clearly got over the line by a good couple of yards via diving, then they spotted it so close to the line that they had to do that flag thing. That was the most glaring example, but it happened a lot, whether giving or giving. I mentioned in #48. They wouldn’t be my first choice to lay out a corn field, that’s for sure. ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Gene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecae2f/32.png) [@Soylent\_Gene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Gene)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/73 "2006-02-06T23:36:30Z")
> [@BlackNGold](#): > > The only call that I can even contemplate as a game-breaker was the pass interference in the end zone. That was a bad call. Against the rules, but receivers make a career of pushing off like that and it’s almost never called. Hell, right here Plex did that almost every reception. > > The rest of the bad calls were incidental to the outcome. I thought the “holding” call on the Jeremy Stephens catch at the 1 was the biggest game breaker of all. We could have gone up 17-14 with a whole lot of momentum. That bad call broke my spirit, and I think the Seahawks were broken as well. ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Gene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecae2f/32.png) [@Soylent\_Gene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Gene)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2006, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/74 "2006-02-06T23:41:24Z")
> [@BlackNGold](#): > > Pittsburgh made the plays they needed to, Seattle didn’t. I wish there wasn’t some kind of “cloud” over this win, but both teams played kind of poorly. Pittsburgh more than Seattle, but Seattle blew it at bigger moments. Sometimes teams need to win despite bad officiating. Pittsburgh did at Indy, Seattle didn’t. Actually, Seattle played pretty good. They DID make some great plays. They ran up almost 400 yards of offense on the vaunted Steeler defense. Take away some of the dropped passes and the bad calls, and the Hawks win. All I remember Pittsburgh doing was 3 huge offensive plays, and the Hasselbeck pick. The rest of the game they stunk. ---
**Author:** ![igloorex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/858c86/32.png) [@igloorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/igloorex)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/75 "2006-02-07T01:21:49Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > There was a Jeremy Stevens catch and fumble that was ruled an incomplete pass. This was the most egregiously bad call in the entire game. The receiver caught the ball, tucked it away and took a complete step (maybe even two). Live it was obviously a fumble. On replay, it was a truly unbelievable call. I couldn’t believe the announcers weren’t going berzerk, though it was mentioned in passing at the start of the next play. As for the rest… The PI call was a toss-up. I think there was definite deliberate contact, which was unfortunate because it wasn’t needed for the receiver to make the catch. I think that’s why the call _seemed_ so bad - it isn’t like like he interfered with the defender to be able to make the catch, because he didn’t need to. But he did nonetheless interefere with the defender (though granted not by much). The (was it a) touchdown call I believe was correctly made. Live, I thought “no way,” but on replay, it seemed crystal clear to me that the nose of the ball broke the plane of the beginning of the white strip by a couple of inches, then, after he was down, went back into the endzone a second time. (Thank you, HDTV!) The low blocking call was pretty bad… maybe even as bad as the “incomplete pass” that was clearly a fumble. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/76 "2006-02-07T02:53:57Z")
Ok. Let’s assume that it was a pushoff (it wasn’t) and Roetlisberger scored (he didn’t). The ONE CALL everyone agrees on was the phanton hold. That ONE CALL is not made and the Seahwks are first and goal on the 2 prepared to go AHEAD 17-14. Maybe the Seahawks would have lost but maybe psychologically (by retaking the lead) and forcing the Steelers to come from behind (i.e. counting on Roethlisberger more) would have resulted in a Seattle win. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/77 "2006-02-07T03:04:52Z")
And if your mom had balls she’d be your dad. The calls were all legit except for the chop block on Hasselbeck. I’m sorry your team lost. But after the hosing that Pittsburgh endured in the Indy game (among others) I’m certainly not going to apologize for them getting the calls, and if you think I’m thinking that this is a “tainted” win you’d better think again. The Lombardi Trophy looks the same no matter how you win it. ---
**Author:** ![VarlosZ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d78d45/32.png) [@VarlosZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VarlosZ)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/78 "2006-02-07T03:08:22Z")
> [@VarlosZ](#): > > The low block on Hasselbeck is really dependent on how the rule is phrased (little help?) The way they seem to call it, in any event, is that if you go low on a fumble or INT return and hit anyone other than the ball-carrier, it’s a penalty, regardless of who you were aiming for. It rarely comes up, but the call tonight was consistent with the common enforcement of the rule. I retract this part of my argument. I saw a replay on TV today, on Hasselbeck did not actually make contact with a Pittsburgh blocker, it only looked like he did. That was just a blown call. On the other hand, I’m even more convinced about the interference call. ‘Swatting the defender’s arm away from him’??? Yeesh. Hand is placed on chest as the elbow is flexed; hand stays there as receiver changes direction away from the defender and towards the ball; arm extends fully (or almost fully). Push. Off. ---
**Author:** ![JonScribe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3be4f8/32.png) [@JonScribe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JonScribe)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/79 "2006-02-07T03:29:13Z")
> [@Airman Doors](#): > > … The Lombardi Trophy looks the same no matter how you win it. Keep repeating that **Airman** and it will eventually sound true to you. But that sounds like an admission that the Steelers didn’t win it solely on their own skill. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191/80 "2006-02-07T03:32:19Z")
Interesting point of data: ESPN columnist Skip Bayless, who is (to say the least) not a fan of Seattle, [actually wrote a column sympathetic to the Seahawks](http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=bayless/060205) re: the officiating issue. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-abyssmal-super-bowl-officiating/343191.md?page=5)