Breaking down "The Call that wasn't" (1 Viewer)

[GoBirds]

I'm shocked that the NFL came out and admitted they missed a holding call, I have never seen them admit to missing holding... wow

So is this what its going to come to? Next we'll have a detailed list of every call that was missed after every game. Cant wait for that. Maybe they need two more refs on the field? More cameras with officials watching for penalties? There will be a creepy whistle from above, as a flag drops from the rafters. A robot voice will announce the penalty..............QB's will play in plastic bubbles with a mechanical arm to throw with. If defensive players even talk to the opposing QB, they will be flagged for harassment. Eligible receivers will have an area around them that defenders cannot enter.

Keep the excuses coming....I love it.

No excuses. I'll admit the Cowboys benefitted from some calls/non-calls, but so did the Lions.....I honestly don't want to see the NFL issuing statements and apologies about missed calls. I think its opening a can of worms that don't need to be opened. These kinds of things should be handled at yearly employee reviews, just like with any employee of a business.....If refs keep missing calls, get rid of em....Good ones get compensated. I'll also admit I'm biased in my assessment.......My responses are typically to offset the biased haters piling on.....Since we're being honest, most want to see the Cowboys lose, and when there's controversy involving them, it goes beyond objective analysis......And yes it annoys me.....Shoulda been my new years resolution to not let it bug me! Too late! Someone call the Wahhmbulance!

We aren't there yet but are making serious progress.

-sure Lions benefitted from some calls as all teams do but no comparison here.

-nfl apology should be a big red flag...thus won't we the new norm it's because those 3 calls were that bad.

-admit bias....check

-you are probably right yall catch a lot of ####. I think you are somewhat reasonable about realizing it's not because you are elite as some on here still feel(cough banker...cough)....more from Jerry/"Americas Team" label. It's understandable.

But when a thread like this is started for a Cowboys coombaya session you have to expect some ball busting.

That good progress for today.

 

[Manster]

Come on man, quit being so dramatic. You act like this the worst thing to ever happen in sports...EVER....PERIOD.

It is precedent setting. PERIOD.

There are bad calls, missed calls, and reversed calls all the time. There were plenty in this game. This call is unprecedented... PERIOD... and will likely result in some type of procedure/rules change during the offseason.

It was bad communication with the officials on the field. Its that simple. It was a questionable call. Yea, Hitchens had his hand on Pettigrew, but Pettigrew had his hand all up in Hitchens facemask (which even analysts on NFL Network don't seem to want to mention....strange).

So you have faceguarding, which isn't illegal in the NFL........There was contact between both players, which we know that typically, offensive players get away with everything they want, as long its not SUPER obvious.......I get the argument that Hitchens wasn't looking for the ball, but in real time the play happened very quickly. Big contact doesn't happen till after the ball is already in the turf. Its not like the refs had time to look at it like a reviewed play (maybe they should have!).

If anything, this should invoke the ability for the refs to stop everything, take a breath, and look at under the hood. Then make the right call.

 

[zftcg]

I still don't get how Cowboy fans can argue how horrible a decision this was. It is absolutely unprecedented in the history of the NFL... that's how bad it is.

Look... refs miss calls or make bad calls all the time. It's human nature. Some games they do a better job than other. In this game, fans of both teams can argue that there were missed calls on both sides (Dez coming onto the field, the Dallas kicker getting run into, etc... probably 4-5 on both teams).

There are also calls reversed in games all the time. A flag is thrown, refs get together immediately, talk about a play, and pick up a flag. Happens all the time

What makes "the call" different than anything else in this game (or any other game in the history of the NFL) is the process that it was handled.

NEVER... EVER... has a flag been thrown, the penalty been announced by the ref at the stadium, the penalty marked off, the ball spotted, and then... THEN... have a flag reversed. IT HAS NEVER HAPPENED... EVER. Whether the call was right or not is irrelevant. One can argue that the call was correct or that it wasn't, it's a judgment call. But once it's made, announced, marked off, and the ball spotted. That should be the end of the story. PERIOD.

If you don't get why this call is different than any other call in the game (or any other game in the history of the league for that matter) then you just don't get it and you never will.

In football...

There are bad calls

There are missed calls

There are reversed calls

and then... then... there was this call. 1st of its kind. EVER

Wrong, for the record, the worst call in history was the Golden Taint catch that wasn't giving Sea the win. Followed by the Holy Roller. In comparison, this call may as well been off sides on an extra point enforced on the kickoff. Especially meaningless.

Except for the fact that Tate's catch was legit (well, other than his push-off, but it's hard to argue that an uncalled OPI on a Hail Mary was the worst call in the history of the NFL).

And for the record, the league office backed up the replacement refs' decision in that game, whereas they cited numerous errors Morelli's crew made in Sunday's game.

 

[zftcg]

Come on man, quit being so dramatic. You act like this the worst thing to ever happen in sports...EVER....PERIOD.

It is precedent setting. PERIOD.

There are bad calls, missed calls, and reversed calls all the time. There were plenty in this game. This call is unprecedented... PERIOD... and will likely result in some type of procedure/rules change during the offseason.

It was bad communication with the officials on the field. Its that simple. It was a questionable call. Yea, Hitchens had his hand on Pettigrew, but Pettigrew had his hand all up in Hitchens facemask (which even analysts on NFL Network don't seem to want to mention....strange).

As I mentioned upthread, Blandino did address this, saying that Pettigrew's grabbing of the face mask should not have been called, while the Hitchens hold should have been.

 

[fred_1_15301]

I just watched that replay around 15 times and I still don't see how they could reverse that call. To me, that play is almost always called defensive PI in today's game. Hitchens did hit his arm before the ball got there. I agree that Pettigrew may have hit Hitchen's facemask but that honestly seemed like minimal contact. Regardless, that call almost always favors the offensive player. At a minimum, there should have been PI called on at least one of the 2 players since there was contact by both players before the ball got there.

 

[Dragon1952]

There are some sensitive butt hurt Eagles fans in here.

Seriously, you guys should get over the fact your wheels fell off, and try to get it fixed, instead of blaming the car that beat you.

Some of the stuff being thrown out like, "Well it's all good, cause the Cowboys will draft lower than us!" Is pathetic.

#1) you would all trade places with us if you could

#2) it's not like you have been nailing those draft picks anyway, that a 2 position increase is going to send fear in the NFC East.

Take it like a man, and move on.

Its a good laugh watching you whiny Dallas fans defend your win you should never have had between the DPI followed by the holding non call on 4th down. Sorry bud, unless you are playing on Superbowl Sunday no one wants to trade places with you and given your QB and playing on the road I dont like your chances. You Dallas fans should start another thread though trying to defend it, it does give Eagles fans something to make fun of.

I'm not a Cowboy or Lion fan, but IMO you can't single out a couple plays out of an entire game and say either one caused the win or loss.There were 14 penalties in that game. Did the NFL look at every single one and say whether it was a 'good' or 'bad' call? There were 125 offensive plays, 10 kick-offs and 8 punts. Did they look at every single one of those and determine whether there were missed penalties that could have been called? You're #####ing about 2 plays that got singled out for scrutiny out of 143. If they looked at every single play I'm sure there were others that Detroit got away with too.

yes they do actually look at EVERY play to see if it was officiated properly.......

But they don't air their findings in public on every call that should have been and vice versa. They use it to judge the officials.

 

[GoBirds]

There are some sensitive butt hurt Eagles fans in here.

Seriously, you guys should get over the fact your wheels fell off, and try to get it fixed, instead of blaming the car that beat you.

Some of the stuff being thrown out like, "Well it's all good, cause the Cowboys will draft lower than us!" Is pathetic.

#1) you would all trade places with us if you could

#2) it's not like you have been nailing those draft picks anyway, that a 2 position increase is going to send fear in the NFC East.

Take it like a man, and move on.

Its a good laugh watching you whiny Dallas fans defend your win you should never have had between the DPI followed by the holding non call on 4th down. Sorry bud, unless you are playing on Superbowl Sunday no one wants to trade places with you and given your QB and playing on the road I dont like your chances. You Dallas fans should start another thread though trying to defend it, it does give Eagles fans something to make fun of.

I'm not a Cowboy or Lion fan, but IMO you can't single out a couple plays out of an entire game and say either one caused the win or loss.There were 14 penalties in that game. Did the NFL look at every single one and say whether it was a 'good' or 'bad' call? There were 125 offensive plays, 10 kick-offs and 8 punts. Did they look at every single one of those and determine whether there were missed penalties that could have been called? You're #####ing about 2 plays that got singled out for scrutiny out of 143. If they looked at every single play I'm sure there were others that Detroit got away with too.

yes they do actually look at EVERY play to see if it was officiated properly.......

But they don't air their findings in public on every call that should have been and vice versa. They use it to judge the officials.

Because every call is not as brutal as these train wreck calls DUH. That's why they had to go public.

 

[Dragon1952]

There are some sensitive butt hurt Eagles fans in here.

Seriously, you guys should get over the fact your wheels fell off, and try to get it fixed, instead of blaming the car that beat you.

Some of the stuff being thrown out like, "Well it's all good, cause the Cowboys will draft lower than us!" Is pathetic.

#1) you would all trade places with us if you could

#2) it's not like you have been nailing those draft picks anyway, that a 2 position increase is going to send fear in the NFC East.

Take it like a man, and move on.

Its a good laugh watching you whiny Dallas fans defend your win you should never have had between the DPI followed by the holding non call on 4th down. Sorry bud, unless you are playing on Superbowl Sunday no one wants to trade places with you and given your QB and playing on the road I dont like your chances. You Dallas fans should start another thread though trying to defend it, it does give Eagles fans something to make fun of.

I'm not a Cowboy or Lion fan, but IMO you can't single out a couple plays out of an entire game and say either one caused the win or loss.There were 14 penalties in that game. Did the NFL look at every single one and say whether it was a 'good' or 'bad' call? There were 125 offensive plays, 10 kick-offs and 8 punts. Did they look at every single one of those and determine whether there were missed penalties that could have been called? You're #####ing about 2 plays that got singled out for scrutiny out of 143. If they looked at every single play I'm sure there were others that Detroit got away with too.

yes they do actually look at EVERY play to see if it was officiated properly.......

But they don't air their findings in public on every call that should have been and vice versa. They use it to judge the officials.

Because every call is not as brutal as these train wreck calls DUH. That's why they had to go public.

I'm sure there are plenty as brutal all season long if you break down every single play in every single game. It's just that these happened in a nationally televised playoff game, with an enormous viewership, in the 4th Q of a close game.

 

[zftcg]

I'm shocked that the NFL came out and admitted they missed a holding call, I have never seen them admit to missing holding... wow

So is this what its going to come to? Next we'll have a detailed list of every call that was missed after every game. Cant wait for that. Maybe they need two more refs on the field? More cameras with officials watching for penalties? There will be a creepy whistle from above, as a flag drops from the rafters. A robot voice will announce the penalty..............QB's will play in plastic bubbles with a mechanical arm to throw with. If defensive players even talk to the opposing QB, they will be flagged for harassment. Eligible receivers will have an area around them that defenders cannot enter.

Um, you do know that we've already had something like that for years, right?

I don't pay attention to things like that. But yea, I'm sure the Officials have a QA kinda deal for going over their performance. That makes sense. The point I was trying to make, is how far will this go? Maybe if theres more than 6 missed calls on one team, the game is replayed? The win goes into another column with an asterisk? I'm exaggerating, but now you get my point?

The problem with making slippery slope arguments in one scenario is that pretty soon you're forced to make them in every scenario.

All kidding aside, who in the hell is proposing replaying games or asterisk wins? All people are asking for is transparency and accountability. I think it's very admirable that the NFL does that. Would you prefer the FIFA model, where a ref disallowed a potential game-winning goal by the US against Slovenia in the 2010 World Cup, and not only did FIFA never offer an explanation, to this day no one even knows which player the foul was called on?

 

[Manster]

Come on man, quit being so dramatic. You act like this the worst thing to ever happen in sports...EVER....PERIOD.

It is precedent setting. PERIOD.

There are bad calls, missed calls, and reversed calls all the time. There were plenty in this game. This call is unprecedented... PERIOD... and will likely result in some type of procedure/rules change during the offseason.

It was bad communication with the officials on the field. Its that simple. It was a questionable call. Yea, Hitchens had his hand on Pettigrew, but Pettigrew had his hand all up in Hitchens facemask (which even analysts on NFL Network don't seem to want to mention....strange).

As I mentioned upthread, Blandino did address this, saying that Pettigrew's grabbing of the face mask should not have been called, while the Hitchens hold should have been.

I didn't see Blandino talk about it. I wonder why he thinks the facemask is okay? Because he's on offense?

 

[Manster]

I just watched that replay around 15 times and I still don't see how they could reverse that call. To me, that play is almost always called defensive PI in today's game. Hitchens did hit his arm before the ball got there. I agree that Pettigrew may have hit Hitchen's facemask but that honestly seemed like minimal contact. Regardless, that call almost always favors the offensive player. At a minimum, there should have been PI called on at least one of the 2 players since there was contact by both players before the ball got there.

Huh? He grabbed his facemask and held onto it.

 

[flapgreen]

And why did you start this thread?

 

[Routilla]

Go Cowboys!

 

[fred_1_15301]

I just watched that replay around 15 times and I still don't see how they could reverse that call. To me, that play is almost always called defensive PI in today's game. Hitchens did hit his arm before the ball got there. I agree that Pettigrew may have hit Hitchen's facemask but that honestly seemed like minimal contact. Regardless, that call almost always favors the offensive player. At a minimum, there should have been PI called on at least one of the 2 players since there was contact by both players before the ball got there.

Huh? He grabbed his facemask and held onto it.

I'm not a Dallas fan nor am I hater and I think you're exaggerating it. There was very little contact by Pettigrew (even Blandino admitted that). I would almost never see that called. Hitchens did hit his arm before the ball got there. To me, that is almost always called PI on the defense. In this case, it actually was called PI on the defense and then picked up. Anyways, you're a Dallas fan so obviously you'll defend that call. I can respect that. I'm done thinking about that call. As I said in another thread, Dallas still made the plays and deserves to move on. This thread never should have been started.

 

[GoBirds]

flapgreen, on 08 Jan 2015 - 12:41 AM, said:And why did you start this thread?

So they could all come to one place to make excuses apparently.

 

[isiahcleaves]

Come on man, quit being so dramatic. You act like this the worst thing to ever happen in sports...EVER....PERIOD.

It is precedent setting. PERIOD.

There are bad calls, missed calls, and reversed calls all the time. There were plenty in this game. This call is unprecedented... PERIOD... and will likely result in some type of procedure/rules change during the offseason.

It was bad communication with the officials on the field. Its that simple. Its not like the refs had time to look at it like a reviewed play (maybe they should have!).

If anything, this should invoke the ability for the refs to stop everything, take a breath, and look at under the hood. Then make the right call.

It was bad communication with officials on the field. Unprecedented bad communication when the flag gets thrown, announced, marked off, and the ball spotted before reversing the call.

The refs DID look at it. Maybe not like a reviewed play... but don't even try to tell me they didn't look up at the biggest jumbotron in the world in that 40 seconds and have that effect the overall judgment.

Your last statement... looking under the hood... that is the rules change that I expect to see come out of this. By the way, I'm not in favor of it (it'll just slow down the game and "bad calls" will still be made depending on your homerism vantagepoint).

Again... this call was horrible because of HOW IT HAPPENED, not THAT IT HAPPENED. A call that occurred in the manner that it did SHOULD NEVER HAPPEN in an NFL game and will likely result in a rules change. Just like the Megatron "process" catch and the Jim Schwartz "challenge flag" rule.

What do these all have in common? OH YEAH... THEY ALL INVOLVE THE LIONS GETTING SCREWED

 

[Routilla]

And why did you start this thread?

To give Cowboys haters a thread of their own?

 

[Manster]

I think I'm done with all this......Its just funny to me that people cant admit (even Blandino) that there was an OBVIOUS facemask on Pettigrew. It was ####### obvious!! The whole thing was strange, and continues to be strange.

 

[dhockster]

I think I'm done with all this......Its just funny to me that people cant admit (even Blandino) that there was an OBVIOUS facemask on Pettigrew. It was ####### obvious!! The whole thing was strange, and continues to be strange.

Hypothetical: The pass is complete. The refs throw a flag on Pettigrew for facemask. They announce the penalty and mark it off. The refs then get together and pick up the flag and give the Lions a first down. As a Cowboy fan, are you upset?

 

[fred_1_15301]

I think I'm done with all this......Its just funny to me that people cant admit (even Blandino) that there was an OBVIOUS facemask on Pettigrew. It was ####### obvious!! The whole thing was strange, and continues to be strange.

Hypothetical: The pass is complete. The refs throw a flag on Pettigrew for facemask. They announce the penalty and mark it off. The refs then get together and pick up the flag and give the Lions a first down. As a Cowboy fan, are you upset?

Of course he is.

 

[moondog]

My guess is Dallas will not get any close calls in the GB game to go in their favor.

 

[isiahcleaves]

Hypothetical: The pass is complete. The refs throw a flag on Pettigrew for facemask. They announce the penalty and mark it off. The refs then get together and pick up the flag and give the Lions a first down. As a Cowboy fan, are you upset?

Of course he is.

And this thread has at least 10 times more responses by now. I know this has received a lot of media attention, but could you imagine what the hypothetical scenario posted would result in? And people thought Kardashian's ### broke the internet...

 

[Amused to Death]

I think I'm done with all this......Its just funny to me that people cant admit (even Blandino) that there was an OBVIOUS facemask on Pettigrew. It was ####### obvious!! The whole thing was strange, and continues to be strange.

Hypothetical: The pass is complete. The refs throw a flag on Pettigrew for facemask. They announce the penalty and mark it off. The refs then get together and pick up the flag and give the Lions a first down. As a Cowboy fan, are you upset?

IMO what should have happened was offsetting penalties on the OPI/DPI, then 15 yds unsportsmanlike on Dez - 1st down Detroit. But even Dallas fans have to admit the missed D holding. That was obvious. Dallas fans are very defensive. Just own the missed call and enjoy your extra week.