NFL Officials got it RIGHT by overturning Cleaveland's first down (my title)

To all of the official bashers out there, time to eat a little crow... Take a look at the following excerpts from NFL reviewing end of Browns-Jaguars game (Click the link to read the entire article).

According to the article, the NFL reached a conclusion today that the "...correct procedures were followed and the correct decision made when replay overturned what had been ruled a fourth-down catch by Cleveland's Quincy Morgan."

BUT, BUT... All the Cleveland fans whine -- you CAN'T challenge a play when another play has been run -- EVERYBODY knows that.

Well, turns out that's not really how it played out. NFL's Director of Officiating Mike Pereira described what happened:

"The Browns were in a no-huddle offense trying to get to the line of scrimmage to snap the ball and stop the clock. Things were moving very quickly. When the pager went off (just before the snap), the referee allowed the play to take place before confirming with the umpire and the replay assistant that he was paged for a review."

Now you can sit here and debate about the rule all you want, but the fact is that the officials got it right AGAIN!

Aren't we a little sensative????

Look - I spent a number of years is Cleveland. My ONLY memories are going to the games at old Municipal Stadium.

IT WAS A PIG STYE!

It was a Pig Sty because the people acted like Pigs!

The "Mens rooms," with their sheet metal troughs, that had NEVER even been hosed down, were my first indication that it was not going to get any better!

Watching the low rent Morons do Everything except watch the game, was another unique experience.

These clowns don't go there to enjoy the game - they went in order to tell their friends how drunk they got and how stupid they were!

I was there when Sh*t for Brains Modell slithered out of town!

I thought perhaps that Cleveland deserved to have an NFL team - because it really is a great sports town.

After yesterday, all I could think of was "nothing has changed!"

I watched the game and agree with you. They showed a replay of the official reaching to turn off his buzzer after the end of the spike play. The cover story was cooked up during the long delay. People make mistakes and officials are people, but this was simply CYA. I certainly reject any claims the officials didn't have time to blow the play dead. I've seen it done hundreds of times when a timeout is requested right at the moment the ball is snapped.

I take it the only reason for a buzzer is for this very instance - a review by the officials in the booth. If correct, then the three refs on the field were negligent in not immediately blowing their whistles in reponse to the buzzer. Technically, the buzzer stopped the play, so by not blowing their whistles, regardless of what point the play had progressed to, the field refs violated their own procedures.

The real problem is with NFL rules. The rules have been almost continuously changed to squeeeze in more commercials and make game times consistently fit in the three hour window. Whose stupid idea was it to have the ref gallop after the ball at the completion of a play to spot it for the next play. The only reason is to predict game durations. I've seen this potentially affect several outcomes. College rules are more sensible. Clock stops temporarily to spot the ball (and, as appropriate, move the chains), then the 25 second clock starts. Fair for everybody, no unrealistic pressure on the refs, no room for complaints about how the ref should have hustled. With the college rule, if this was indeed an equipment malfunction (highly unlikely), this probably would not have happened as the short interval between plays would have allowed time to sort it all out.

What exactly was wrong with what the fans did??

What exactly was right with what the fans did?

60,000 people yelling??-----ya it was loud.

And if only that was what it was...Trust me: I've heard louder crowd noise. I have seen real bad officiating (in my game, we call it umpiring). But the ones I have seen simply did not seize upon real or allegedly bad officiating as an excuse to behave like infants throwing their cereal bowls out of their cribs bouncing them off the walls, because Mommy gave them mere oatmeal instead of their Maypo for breakfast again, so to say.

Throwing plastic on the field??-----ya thats littering. But riot????

Let me guess: Told of gang rumbles in your youth where they used anything from cans and rocks to chains and bricks, you thought, "Ah, what's the big deal - nobody got hurt real bad and besides, they were only littering..."

Where do you come off??

Where and with whom I come off is no one's but mine and the lady who grants me the honour. Next question.

Sixty dollars for a ticket??

Incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial. I pay that kind of money to sit in a good seat for a baseball game. But I don't know where it gave me the right to do anything beyond hooting and hollering or hanging smart@$$ banners whenever I think an umpire's call was lame. The minute I begin throwing things around the stands or toward the field, I graduate from a mere fan to at minimum a public nuisance and at maximum, an inciter to riot. (If anything, they should give maximum credit to those fans who did manage to resist the lure of the brat packs.)

I think they deserve to yell and if they feel like it to throw some plastic onto the field.

I give you this from the late sportswriter Dick Young, upbraiding a similarly rowdy crowd at the ancient Polo Grounds:

You think you're something special, and maybe you are, but nobody is so special, ever, that he can take advantage. Make noise? Great. Make noise till you get laryngitis. Paint signs? Great. Paint signs till you get bursitis. But throw things and all that jazz? What sort of slobs are we raising (here)?

Kind of says it all.

Now, run along back to your playpen, sonny...

If the refs really got it right, they would have blown the play dead before the snap of the ball. By allowing the play to go on, they made a mistake.

Not according to the NFL or the Director of Officiating.

The NFL had better take another look at this rule, otherwise they are asking for the same thing to happen again.

The only person on the field that knew that the replay buzzer went off was the referee and he made no attempt to stop play until another play had been run. In any other instance, the fact that another play had been allowed to take place in the game would have made the prior play non-reviewable. Unless the NFL wants to make the replay buzzer loud enough that everyone can hear it, the referee must stop play on the field.

If you allow play to continue without anyone knowing exactly when a replay was called into question, you will have another situation like you had yesterday. The fans will not stand for being kept in the dark while it appears that the referee is making up things as he goes along.

Did you expect the league to not stand behind the ref's decision? That would have really caused them some problems.

Maybe if I thought football was a fairy game to play with flags and guys in pink dresses I would agree with you. But the fact is they dont....its a rough game and the MAJORITY of the people who go and see football games are middle class Americans who like it because of its roughness and its masculine nature. So the fans got out of hand and threw some bottles because they wanted to hear the right call and werent hearing it....that doesnt mean that they were unruly and were trying to start a riot. Listen I am sick of arguing with you guys about this because it is completely being blown out of proportion. Also saying the fans did this because they were all drunk is an overstatement in itself...if I was at the game and I was drinking a coke I still might of thrown it at these dumba***s. Look I am not going to change your mind obviously and you arent going to change my mind. But I would like to say in closing if this would have happened in Pittsburgh that our fans here would have done the same thing.(which was voice our opinion for the RIGHT result)

Maybe if I thought football was a fairy game to play with flags and guys in pink dresses I would agree with you.

I don't dare ask what your idea of "a fairy game to play with flags and guys in pink dresses." But my idea of a game is a balance between brains and body, between mind and acute skill, upholding the primacy of the individual as the critical element in the whole, the team. (See: baseball.) A balance rather shockingly absent in the Cleveland game Sunday and in football period, from where I sit.

But the fact is they dont....its a rough game and the MAJORITY of the people who go and see football games are middle class Americans who like it because of its roughness and its masculine nature.

On the assumption that nothing short of a gaggle of human raw meat smashing into each other while one poor sap hopes to avoid being mangled, tangled, and jangled long enough to throw something which isn't even shaped like a proper ball, fer crissakes, or hand off to another designated sap whose business is to avoid being mauled like a boa constrictor by a mongoose, since when do the middle class values presume a licence for presumed adults attending a presumed sporting contest to cross the line between voluminous rooting and hollering to behave like spoiled brats who didn't get their Maypo for breakfast this morning throwing their cereal bowls off the walls? Refer once more to the aforequoted Dick Young passage and call me in the morning.

So the fans got out of hand and threw some bottles because they wanted to hear the right call and werent hearing it....that doesnt mean that they were unruly and were trying to start a riot.

Why not find out where you can sign up to join Al Sharpton's organisation? I understand they're always looking for a few good excusemakers for riots. I'd like to hear the right things said, the right rules handed down, too. And I exercise my right to protest when I do not hear them. But there is a difference between my right to protest and any licence to run amok like a bull with a blunt harpoon shoved into his ass when I do not hear them.

Listen I am sick of arguing with you guys about this because it is completely being blown out of proportion.

I may almost be glad not to have known you when the Los Angeles riots of 1992 struck. Or, the notorious soccer riots.

Also saying the fans did this because they were all drunk is an overstatement in itself...

It is not an overstatement, it is perilously close to making excuses for loutishness. And "loutishness" may indeed prove the most polite word to apply here. It almost doesn't matter what the fans had consumed when they "did this". If they had consumed nothing more than Hostess Twinkies and Snapple grape juice, they would still be guilty and have no legitimate excuse for it.

...if I was at the game and I was drinking a coke I still might of thrown it at these dumba***s.

If a judge in traffic court rules against your side, would you consider yourself thus licenced to throw whatever projectile you saw fit to throw at that dumbass? I say again: I have seen plenty of dumb, dishonest, and deconstructive rulings in plenty of sporting contests, real or alleged, and I have heard thick enough crowds screaming blue murder in the stands over such rulings. But there is a line (and it ain't the 40-yard line) between merely screaming blue murder en masse and throwing projectiles around the stadium or toward the errant arbiters.

Look I am not going to change your mind obviously and you arent going to change my mind.

Regarding the former, I shall sleep in heavenly peace tonight (and every night). Regarding the latter, more is the pity.

But I would like to say in closing if this would have happened in Pittsburgh that our fans here would have done the same thing.(which was voice our opinion for the RIGHT result)

Which means nothing more than that Pittsburgh football fans have it in them to be louts on the level of Cleveland Browns fans. And that both would make a pair of rather pleasant cities resemble the world's largest insane asylums.

Ref, I'm not going to get into a urinating match with you on this. I'm not even a Browns fan. But until I see the rules that say otherwise, I'm sticking with my first take, based on what I saw and my understanding of the rules. And that understanding is that the officials cannot review a play after the next play has been run. Period. No matter whether a coach or the replay official calls for one. Not even if the ref thinks he got the page before the play. Not even if it's the last two minutes of the game and the offense is running no-huddle and spiking the ball. No exceptions. I saw another play start and end before McAulay reviewed the Morgan catch. I can't unsee what I saw. I'm not calling Pereira, McAulay and their colleagues liars. I am saying that what they say happened is not what I saw happen. It doesn't matter whether McAulay made the right call on review, because under the rules, he never should have been under the hood in the first place.

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