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The refs allowed Seattle's line to get away with holding constantly. That could well have changed the outcome of the game. Luckily, it did not. Watching Chimo literally tackled on play after play, sometimes with a Seahawk sitting on top of him when the whistle blew had me howling at the poor officiating myself.

Specifically, what are the Left Coast whiners whining about?

A "bad" pass interference call in the end zone. WRONG. That was a good call. Pushing off a defender with the ball in the air is pass interference. On the replay, the official is reaching for his flag as the receiver pushes off, not after the ball arrived. He saw (and called) the right transgression immediately. No touchdown as "taken away" from the 'Hawks. A play with an offensive penalty is a non-play, and there was no score.
Roethlisberger didn't cross the plane of the goal line. WRONG. The tip of the ball clearly crosses the plane in the goal, while Ben is in the air, and was pushed back by the Seattle defender--too late. Claims by Seahawk fans that Roethlisberger moved the ball into the end zone after he was already down are a red herring. The official didn't award the TD on that basis.
A "bad" holding call on a play that would have placed Seattle at the one. WRONG. Seattle was holding on that down, and on almost every down of that drive, and finally they got caught. Of course John Madden didn't think it was holding. He coached a team for ten years that played exactly the same way: the most penalized team of the 1970's. But John Madden wasn't on the field. The officials were, and they were right.
Hasselbeck was improperly flagged for a chop on a legal tackle. RIGHT. A terrible call by the refs. But guess what? This was the least consequential of the supposed miscues, because the fundamental problem was that the Steelers now had the ball and proceeded to chew up four minutes. The additional 15 yards of field distance was nothing compared to the fact that the Seattle defense couldn't stop Pittsburgh from getting a game-winning first down.
So essentially you're saying "bad officiating" because of ONE PLAY. Please get real.
As for the poor quality of referee'ing in the NFL, please don't presume to lecture to a Steeler fan about that. We had an AFC title game taken away from us on the penultimate play of the game that placed Tennessee into field goal range, and had a 28-10 stomping of Indianapolis turned into a 21-18 thriller by an absolutely hideous misinterpretation of the rules by the officials. Cowher has repeatedly embarrassed the zebras over the last 14 years by pointing (often on the field, during the game) to places in the rulebook where they've been wrong.
The NFL needs professional referees. Their refs need to be schooled in the rules and drilled on film during the week. The replay rule needs to be revised so that it's handled the way it was designed in the Big Ten: review every play by independent officials. It shouldn't be necessary for a coach--often stymied by the refusal of the home replay team to air video they know is detrimental to their cause--to have to challenge the call. Officials should be self-policing. In at least one College conference they are. They also need to use the scorecards they score every week on officiating crews to eliminate all but the very best squads from the playoffs--just as all but the best teams are eliminated. To simply reward officials with at least one playoff spot because they've ref'd during the season is an atrocity. And they need to use the grading system to "cut" those officials and teams with the lowest scores at the start of the next season--not just a handfull of truly terrible officials at the season's end as they do now.
To their credit, Homgren's team was better than their fans. They admitted they dropped balls. They admitted they overthrew receivers. They admitted they failed to cover receivers. Their coaching staff prepared poorly for some plays. Their clock management at the end of both halves was genuinely inept.
Believe me, Coach Holmgren and his staff aren't going to waste one second next season telling their players they lost because of poor officiating. They didn't. They played a better team and they lost. The Seahawks know it, and they'll be a better team next year because they'll grow from it. Their fans need to do the same.

Your article is very well written.
I may disagree with some of your points, but you spent some time on it, and it shows.

I believe that the Hawks could have won REGARDLESS of the calls (right or wrong) if they had been playing their best game.
They didn't, and so they didn't! :-)

The only thing that I will point out is this though.
Seattle "fans" are not the only ones complaining about the calls.
Go here to see this ESPN poll (very unscientific I am sure though!)

http://espn.go.com/

All in all, thanks for such a well written post..

To add to the Roethlisberger touchdown that some are disputing, wasn't that a third down play??? So, it becomes 4th and inches, Cowher goes for it of course and 99 out of 100 times we score.

I know there are "online polls" out there with numbers favoring officials blowing calls. Same online polls that claim Bush "stole the elections" in 2000 and 2004.