BBQ vs. Cheesesteaks: Super Bowl LVII running thread

Calling the game late differently from how you called it earlier is poor officiating no matter which direction the change takes place.

 

If an umpire is calling a shoulder-high ball a strike all game, and a pitcher throws a shoulder-high pitch with the bases loaded in the ninth and it's called a ball, walking in the winning run . . . did the umpire do the right thing?

 

I thought using screen grabs of non-calls from other games was dumb. Now we’re using analogies from different sports?

 

The reason why the hold was call was that it was obvious and in open space. It wasn’t the most egregious grabbing of a player who is definitely going to score a TD without the hold, but I don’t see how the ref could have swallowed the flag there.

 

It's too high.

 

So, are those of you saying officials should not officiate differently at the ends of games not acknowledging that this has happened since the beginning of time? Only in this case it kind of took place in reverse. They didn’t call something all game and then all of a sudden a flag comes out and gift wraps a championship. And I guess that’s my bigger beef here, if I even have one.

And no, not calling that would not have screwed the Chiefs. It would merely have allowed to Eagles to maintain a pulse. And yes, the Eagles, completely going dormant in the second half hurt them way more than that penalty did. But the penalty completely snuffed them out.

I feel like the fans/viewers are who got screwed. The whole country is watching, most of us without a rooting interest. That call denied a better ending to a great game and the fact that we’re still talking about this a couple days later instead of the first 59 minutes says something.

 

I'm fairly agnostic on this, but I wonder what the fervor might've been had the context changed. Let's say the officials don't throw the flag. Fine. But then what if the replay comes back and shows the tug on the jersey and Greg Olsen and the ref in the booth begin pondering, "Oh, Bradberry got away with a hold there. That would've been an automatic first down."

And then what if Butker misses the longer field goal? And what if the Eagles go down the field and win? Or, simpler, what if Butker makes, and the Eagles tie or win? Would the postgame world be up in arms about the noncall? "The Chiefs would've been able to run out the clock!" the world might've said.

A lot of what ifs, I understand. But there are a lot of what-ifs in the current context. I don't know if any way is more right, or correct, than the other.

Anyway, Ted Lasso is back March 15. Onward.

 

In the scenarios you envision UNC, player failures and successes would've determined the outcome of the Super Bowl. That is inherently more satisfying of an ending than what happened for all but the most partisan KC fans. And if KC had made the field goal, and did stop the Eagles, that too would've been way better of an ending.
An official used poor judgment in a moment of maximum stress. It happens. Bad play by an athlete (officials are athletes). But the Eagles' defense didn't make any plays of any kind in the second half. That's why they lost. All the official cost them was a not-great chance of winning despite that. What he cost the rest of us was, you know, the human drama of athletic competition.

 

That last part would help tremendously. The tackles getting early starts are really out of hand.

 

Given that they hadn't been calling it all game, no. Be consistent. Don't suddenly call something you've been letting go all night with the game on the line.

 

If they don't call it, then that would be consistent with what they had done all game, which would have been fine.

 

Exactly. That's why calling the hold in that moment was poor officiating. One reason Bradberry thought he could get away with it is the officials hadn't called a hold all game.