NFL Start Of Season

[FrantzM]

anyone see the end of the Pack vs Seahawks game

Unbelievable how appalling the officiating is. For the Pack to lose that on yet another blown call by the officials is mind boggling

Now if the strike goes on all season, can you imagine the officiating in the playoffs or even worse, The Super Bowl

I was watching the game and am impressed by Seattle Defense .. Scary! .. Then the officiating ... Bad doesn't even begin to describe it ... The last call was unreal .. Jenning had the ball and controlled it the entire time .. The receiver had one hand, one hand!! on the ball They called it after review a touchdown! The NFL is playing with fire and may find it a dangerous game to play. Politicians are getting into it .. I believe one State Senator tweeted about it and this wil register higher within the Political apparatus, for sure ... The NFL may recover, the NBA did after all, but Goodell may not. The owners will need a sacrificial lamb and Goodell who does not look so good after the bounty scandal could be the one..

This distracts from what could have been a great season with those very good rookies playing QBs and the over all high level of competition ...

 

[Steve Williams]

Roger Goodell needs to immediately clean up NFL officiating mess … and issue a public apology

Yahoo Sports

Sometime Tuesday afternoon, after an emergency session of some NFL owners subcommittee and a quick folding in front of a federal labor mediator, commissioner Roger Goodell should step in front of a podium, declare the lockout of the league's referees over and apologize to the coaches, players, fans and replacement officials for the last three weeks of football.
It's the owners who are locking out the refs and must sign off on a contract. And it is the owners who employ Goodell. But at some point, Goodell has to lead his bosses. That's the mark of a great commissioner, and make no mistake, Roger Goodell believes he is a great commissioner.
A great commissioner doesn't stand around and let his league continue on as a laughingstock.
Monday in Seattle, the Seahawks managed to beat Green Bay 14-12 on a Hail Mary pass that the Packers intercepted, but two replacement refs – each appearing terrified at making the call – did nothing. They then made opposite decisions – one signaled what could be an interception, one a definitive TD – but, only, well, there's no good way to explain this.

"I've never seen anything like that in all my years of football," Packers coach Mike McCarthy said. "Very unusual. Most unusual game I've been a part of."
You've seen the replay. If not, turn on a TV and wait 15 seconds. Expect President Obama and Mitt Romney to weigh in by noon.
This is Goodell's Heidi game, a forever blemish he'll never live down. The lockout may not have been his idea but it's on his watch. Someone might as well start pre-production on a documentary now, the image of those two confused refs in the corner of the Seattle end zone is sure to go down in history.
In financial terms, the NFL and the officials union are reportedly battling over about $3 million annually in pension commitments, a drop in the bucket for a $9 billion organization. Like most employers, the NFL doesn't want to deal with pensions anymore, the chief reason this has dragged out. There are also plenty of issues that the union is holding too hard a line also. It's a labor dispute; no one is completely innocent.

But it's the NFL dealing with the fallout. Does it really want another week of being a bad version of pro wrestling?
At least in the WWE, there is a satisfying ending to the script.
The replacement ref experiment is a disaster. It has overwhelmed the league. It's overshadowed strong play. It's turned Goodell's vaunted shield into a joke.
The league didn't find properly trained referees capable of handling the task. It didn't spend enough time training them during the offseason. It didn't back them up immediately when the season began to the constant complaints, criticism and in-game histrionics from players and coaches. That allowed the after-play protests to become constant distractions. That has brought out the worst of their personalities and put it on display.
On back-to-back nights, during its prime-time games, the NFL experienced chaos. In the first, two head coaches [Bill Belichick and John Harbaugh] made physical contact with referees, sandwiching a finish that defied all explanation. Then Green Bay lost a game it won. Seattle won a game it lost. And in Las Vegas, not to mention in books across America, who knows who won or lost what.

"It was awful," Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers said. "Just look at the replay. And then the fact that it was reviewed?"
It's uncertain even why it was reviewed, which merely led to more chaos.
This was just the highest-profile disaster of three weeks building toward it. Too often the games have no flow, no credibility. It's a parade of flags, confused calls and replay-booth bailouts. It doesn't feel like football. The announcers are so enraged they lose focus.
The replacement refs are trying but they aren't remotely prepared. The NFL should've seen this coming and done better. Then again, you can't shine a sneaker: The speed of the game is just overwhelming for Division III and high school officials. The replacement refs aren't trying to screw things up; in fact, they appear so petrified at screwing things up that they overcompensate and screw it up even more.
And just wait until Week 4, after days and days of the fallout from this game.
Goodell has preached and punished with a single focus on "protecting the shield" against any and all tarnish. He's bullied players and batted around coaches.
Now here's his biggest challenge: to stand up to the billionaires that sign his check, end the labor dispute and get on with this. Right now is Goodell's moment to prove he's as tough and as smart and as savvy as he likes to act when he's sitting down an individual behavior for some transgression.

Goodell's NFL is a mess right now. A joke. A punch line. That's what it will continue to be until this gets solved. The regular refs will continue to make mistakes, calls will be blown, controversies will continue. But it won't be this, because it's never been this.
The game is a sideshow. The brilliant performances are an afterthought. The credibility is in question.
To that Goodell needs to end it now before it churns on and on.
And then he needs to apologize to everyone for what's already occurred.

 

[audioguy]

That the final play was reviewed and still called as it was called is a travesty. What a joke!!!

 

[Sammy T]

This is starting to sound like a soap opera with beer commercials

 

[jazdoc]

Someone tweeted that the end of the game was like the 'end of a Buffalo Wild Wings commercial'

 

[Steve Williams]

Goodell to blame for referee debacle.....

Bill Reiter, FOX Sports


This, Roger Goodell, is what you’ve wrought: The low point of the NFL. A great big heaping pile of dog doo staining the shield. A multibillion-dollar game that has turned from national obsession to total mockery in a few short weeks.

Spurred by incompetent officials and a complicit commissioner, the league’s ongoing horror show with its replacement referees hit its nadir Monday night. That’s when the Seattle Seahawks were awarded a 14-12 win over the Green Bay Packers on one of the worst acts of officiating in the history of the game — and when, thanks to Goodell’s ongoing insouciance, America lost its mind.

It started when Seahawks receiver Golden Tate was given a touchdown on the final play of the game, a desperation Hail Mary that Packers safety M.D Jennings clearly caught with his body. Tate got his arm around the ball — after shoving cornerback Sam Shields to the ground — and one official signaled touchdown. And then a video review upheld the absurdity.

What an absolute travesty. What a joke. What a nightmare.

Former NFL coach Jon Gruden, calling the game on television and watching one official indicate the stoppage of play while another signaled touchdown, called it “tragic” and “comical.”

Packers guard TJ Lang tweeted shortly afterward “Got f----ed by the refs.. Embarrassing. Thanks nfl.” Then he tweeted, “F--- it NFL.. Fine me and use the money to pay the regular refs.” And, in case his message was lost on anyone, he threw down this one, too: “Any player/coach in Seattle that really thinks they won that game has zero integrity as a man and should be embarrassed.”

Aaron Rodgers was a little more succinct: “It was awful.”

Everyone had an opinion. Twitter exploded with fans and players bursting with indignation, a social media microcosm for a country that knows it’s getting hosed when it sees it. This wasn’t the NFL we saw Monday, this was some half-baked parody, a game featuring our best athletes paired with some of our least capable minds.

The outrage grew and spread because Gruden, Lang, Rodgers and those like them were right. This is awful, this is tragic, this is whatever swear words you can think of.

This is a farce. It’s an insulting example of the power of incompetence by a group of men (the officials) so mismatched that the Lingerie Football League announced shortly after the game they had fired some of them earlier in the year for incompetence. This is an act of self-sabotage by the NFL so blatant and infuriating that Lang’s tweets, while perhaps getting him fined, also tapped so surely into the zeitgeist that 58,000 people had retweeted his first one within two hours.

Allow me to expand on his thoughts, with a little cleaner language: Roger Goodell, get this fixed. Now.

The replacement refs are an extension of a problem, but they’re not to blame. They’re in over their heads. If someone allowed me to cross a picket line and suit up in place of Aaron Rodgers during a players strike, I’d be just as sure to fail, embarrass the game and myself and set fans and football players to seething. But it wouldn’t entirely be my fault.

It’s not the incompetent officials’ fault they can’t do the job. It’s Goodell’s fault he gave them the job in the first place.

Since taking over at the helm of the NFL, Goodell has forged an image for himself as a my-way-or-the-highway strongman. His rules. His punishments, meted out by him. His prerogative. His league.

So this is his stinking pile of garbage. This is his failure.

Forget whether the actual officials are asking for too much or too little in their dispute with the league. It was Goodell’s job to see this coming, to negotiate on the one hand and protect the game on the other. It was Goodell’s job to make Monday nights in the fall — as they have been for years, well before his reign — a testament to America’s love affair with football.

That was why the NFL printed money, why it was the dominant sport in this country, why its owners and players and league-office suits got filthy rich. Because the game was great, and those in charge of it understood that parity, talent and a well-executed machine made everyone very rich.

Now 'Monday Night Football' is the latest running rebuke of Goodell’s leadership, a fact brought to you by replacement refs so awful the Lingerie League won’t have them. NFL players can’t keep their rage to themselves and fans are seeing for the first time in a generation a level of play that does not live up to the game’s history.

The replacement referees have to go, yes, of course, no doubt. Just don’t forget who put them there — and who, having done so, should bear the full brunt of the blame.

 

[Ki Choi]

We didn't mind the call at all! I think the replacement refs are just fine. Challenge will be to get the same refs for the next Sunday's game for Seahawks. We should pitch in and buy some airline tickets for the same refs to make it happen.

BTW, my son and I had father-and-son quality time at a sports bar in downtown. It was fun regardless of the quality of officiating..., it is indeed just a game after all.

 

[Steve Williams]

NFL’s official statement on final play of Green Bay Packers- Seattle Seahawks Monday Night Football game


NFL admits Seahawks' Golden Tate should have been called for offensive pass interference, but league stands by decision made by replay ref to not over-turn on-field touchdown decision.


NFL STATEMENT ON FINAL PLAY OF GREEN BAY PACKERS-SEATTLE SEAHAWKS GAME
In Monday's game between the Green Bay Packers and Seattle Seahawks, Seattle faced a 4th-and-10 from the Green Bay 24 with eight seconds remaining in the game.
Seattle quarterback Russell Wilson threw a pass into the end zone. Several players, including Seattle wide receiver Golden Tate and Green Bay safety M.D. Jennings, jumped into the air in an attempt to catch the ball.
While the ball is in the air, Tate can be seen shoving Green Bay cornerback Sam Shields to the ground. This should have been a penalty for offensive pass interference, which would have ended the game. It was not called and is not reviewable in instant replay.
When the players hit the ground in the end zone, the officials determined that both Tate and Jennings had possession of the ball. Under the rule for simultaneous catch, the ball belongs to Tate, the offensive player. The result of the play was a touchdown.
Replay Official Howard Slavin stopped the game for an instant replay review. The aspects of the play that were reviewable included if the ball hit the ground and who had possession of the ball. In the end zone, a ruling of a simultaneous catch is reviewable. That is not the case in the field of play, only in the end zone.
Referee Wayne Elliott determined that no indisputable visual evidence existed to overturn the call on the field, and as a result, the on-field ruling of touchdown stood. The NFL Officiating Department reviewed the video today and supports the decision not to overturn the on-field ruling following the instant replay review.
The result of the game is final.
Applicable rules to the play are as follows:
A player (or players) jumping in the air has not legally gained possession of the ball until he satisfies the elements of a catch listed here.
Rule 8, Section 1, Article 3 of the NFL Rule Book defines a catch:
A forward pass is complete (by the offense) or intercepted (by the defense) if a player, who is inbounds:
(a) secures control of the ball in his hands or arms prior to the ball touching the ground; and
(b) touches the ground inbounds with both feet or with any part of his body other than his hands; and
(c) maintains control of the ball long enough, after (a) and (b) have been fulfilled, to enable him to perform any act common to the game (i.e., maintaining control long enough to pitch it, pass it, advance with it, or avoid or ward off an opponent, etc.).
When a player (or players) is going to the ground in the attempt to catch a pass, Rule 8, Section 1, Article 3, Item 1 states:
Player Going to the Ground. If a player goes to the ground in the act of catching a pass (with or without contact by an opponent), he must maintain control of the ball throughout the process of contacting the ground, whether in the field of play or the end zone. If he loses control of the ball, and the ball touches the ground before he regains control, the pass is incomplete. If he regains control prior to the ball touching the ground, the pass is complete.
Rule 8, Section 1, Article 3, Item 5 states:
Simultaneous Catch. If a pass is caught simultaneously by two eligible opponents, and both players retain it, the ball belongs to the passers. It is not a simultaneous catch if a player gains control first and an opponent subsequently gains joint control. If the ball is muffed after simultaneous touching by two such players, all the players of the passing team become eligible to catch the loose ball.

 

[jazdoc]

I'm not sure that the call on the last play of last night's game was the worst call of that game!

Let's not forget that the regular NFL referees are hardly infallible. The officials at Super Bowl XL significantly influenced the outcome of that game.

 

[FrantzM]

I'm not sure that the call on the last play of last night's game was the worst call of that game!

Let's not forget that the regular NFL referees are hardly infallible. The officials at Super Bowl XL significantly influenced the outcome of that game.

Do I feel some very, very slight, maybe a trace of North Pacific Western bias here ..

We are not talking about one mistake here and there .. it was a cornucopia of bad, not even questionable calls which had an impact on the way the game was played ... The outcome was a mere exclamation point. The Patriots game was badly called also as have been most of the games this season so far.. This is a bad situation and needs to be rectified .. This is affecting the game and most fans are very aware of this fact ..

 

[jazdoc]

Do I feel some very, very slight, maybe a trace of North Pacific Western bias here ..

Definitely. We're still bitter about Super Bowel XL up here!

 

[Steve Williams]

There is a deal in the works to have the NFL refs back by this Sunday

 

[audioguy]

There is a deal in the works to have the NFL refs back by this Sunday

"in the works" but not there:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/peter_king/09/26/referees-deal/index.html

Let's keep our fingers crossed !!

 

[FrantzM]

"in the works" but not there:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/peter_king/09/26/referees-deal/index.html

Let's keep our fingers crossed !!

It will work things have gotten ugly and dangerously so .. Vegas is certainly looking at this and so are the politicians ... THe NFL owners and Goodell have a lot to lose, may have lost a bit of credibility already. They are trying to develop a global brand like he NBA and that is not looking good on a world stage ... They will ...



P.S wierd stats from the Seahawks - Packers game The total penalties yard was 245 almost the same as the Packers entire offensive output (268) and higher than the Seahawks' (238) ... I am not sure such has ever happen in modern days football ..

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Do I feel some very, very slight, maybe a trace of North Pacific Western bias here ..

We are not talking about one mistake here and there .. it was a cornucopia of bad, not even questionable calls which had an impact on the way the game was played ... The outcome was a mere exclamation point. The Patriots game was badly called also as have been most of the games this season so far.. This is a bad situation and needs to be rectified .. This is affecting the game and most fans are very aware of this fact ..

my opinion is that the degree of national outrage had much to do with what team supposedly got jobbed....and maybe how much money was bet on the Packers too.

if the harmed team was San Diego, or Kansas City, or even Seattle.....the reaction would have been much much less. nationally no one really cares.

but when you have the universally (particularly on the eastern half of the US) loved Packers with the reigning MVP, or if it would have been the Steelers, or maybe even one of the New York teams, the world comes to an end.

that is the way it is, and the way it's always been.

 

[FrantzM]

my opinion is that the degree of national outrage had much to do with what team supposedly got jobbed....and maybe how much money was bet on the Packers too.

if the harmed team was San Diego, or Kansas City, or even Seattle.....the reaction would have been much much less. nationally no one really cares.

but when you have the universally (particularly on the eastern half of the US) loved Packers with the reigning MVP, or if it would have been the Steelers, or maybe even one of the New York teams, the world comes to an end.

that is the way it is, and the way it's always been.

Seahawks Fan !
If you believe your eyes as any proper subjectivist should .. You know it wasn't a touchdown, especially after the replay
There were a bunch on nonsense calls on Seattle too and it did affect the game ... Like that pass interference on your Safety (#31?) or that roughing the passer that gave Green Bay a first down ... All bad calls ...

You will have your day Seahawks people your team defense is IMPRESSIVE and the offense no slouch either .. This team will create a lot of problem in the ir division and soon will be a force to be reckoned with .. They didn't however win Sunday games the Refs handled it to them

 

[Steve Williams]

if the harmed team was San Diego, or Kansas City, or even Seattle.....the reaction would have been much much less. nationally no one really cares.

but when you have the universally (particularly on the eastern half of the US) loved Packers with the reigning MVP, or if it would have been the Steelers, or maybe even one of the New York teams, the world comes to an end.

that is the way it is, and the way it's always been.

Not sure that I agree with this statement.

The officiating was a disaster in that game and for two referees looking at the play to signal 2 different things is an abomination.That final play will go down in league history as the worst call of all time and it matters not whether it was Green Bay, San Diego, Kansas or Seattle. I didn't bet on the game. Never have and never will and I am sure that I am not alone. It has nothing to do with which team was "jobbed"

 

[MylesBAstor]

 

[MylesBAstor]

 

[FrantzM]

View attachment 5884

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rotflmao