BananaB Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 (edited) I think it’s fixed, no doubt in my mind. The teams the NFL make more money off get the calls. Edited November 30, 2019 by BananaB
Ethan in Cleveland Posted November 30, 2019 Author Posted November 30, 2019 I guess its more than just frustration. Mods should create two in-game threads. One for the tin foil hat wearing referee conspiracy crowd and another for the rest of us.
MattM Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 1 hour ago, Rc2catch said: Watch the games. I don’t have archive footage saved on my phone lol. The pats don’t get every call. As I said the refs blow calls across all games and each teams fan base complains. Read patriot fans comments on Facebook and see how much they cry about the refs being against kraft and against the patriots LMAO—you pontificate one this issue as if you’re a pro, but yet can’t answer a simple question to name a single game they’ve lost on a bad call. I can name probable a dozen they’ve won that way—let’s see, we’ve got “just give it to them”, the Ravens Monday nighter in 2007 (in which there were multiple pro-Pats bad calls in the 4th quarter to allow a game- winning drive, so bad that several Ravens got fined for making comments about the refs, to the game one week later that year against the Giants for game 16 (30 yard penalty swing late when a Pat hit a Giants return man late and out of bounds, but the G-Men get the penalty, to the AFCCG vs the Colts where on successive plays in front of a ref Marcus Pollard was obviously held (the League changed a related rule the next year), to a personal favorite vs the Texans where late in the game Brady throws a late apparently game-sealing pick, but wait, wait, wait for it, there’s an incredibly late flag totally away from the play that the announcers couldn’t even understand, to this gem from a few years back vs the Saints— here’s a shot from the last play of the game where a Saint defender was clearly held as Brady threw the game-winning TD. All off the top of my head. Please provide a similar list of games they got jobbed on and which was controversial across the League, like all of those above were.
Rochesterfan Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 6 hours ago, loveorhatembillsfan4life said: I think there are refs who come in with a preconceived notion of possibly favouring one side more than the other. I have a thought time believing they are completely neutral. when Rex was here, he talked about being a bully On the field . I think the nfl was more likely to Look for calls against us. I think when you hear buffalo bills players come out and say he heard the referee say “just give it to them” game against Dallas I saw more illegal hand penalties in five minutes than I have all season. Pretty ticky tacky on one of the best corners in the league. i listened to Charlie Weis talk about Josh Allen does not get a call sliding feet first when the bigger names qb get that call all the time. a rule is a rule so when it’s blatantly obvious to miss a call because you are not Tom Brady is ridiculous. The issue is that sometimes JA slides, sometimes he dives headfirst, and sometimes he runs right through a defensive player. The defenders and the referees do not know what he is going to do - so they are bound to give the defenders a bit more leeway. The quote supposedly was “he slide late and I am warning you not to do that again”. If JA slides every time - he gets that call right away, but because he tends to maximize his yardage and only slides about 30% of the time - what is a defender supposed to do - you are running at him, but you don’t know if he is going to slide, juke, leap over, or barrel through you - so you have to be prepared and the refs should give the leeway. The refs job is damn near impossible and every call is scrutinized by two fan bases and every fan base thinks they are getting screwed - yes even the Cowboys and the Pats. I do not believe at all that there is any kind of league wide bias or planned outcomes. I think some teams get better teams of officials more often and have a better understanding of what they can get away with as each team calls things differently. If someone said an individual referee was betting on games and had a bias - I could believe that, but it would be rare. If you try to say the league has anything set-up or the league wants calls to go a specific way - I call total BS. There is no way an owner like Jerry Jones - who is outspoken and interviewed as frequently as he is - would allow the Pats to have a run of success that allowed them to pass his team. There is no way these owners as competitive as they are would agree to anything like that - they just would not.
Sherlock Holmes Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 3 hours ago, finn said: Well, I admit even paranoids have real enemies, so a conspiracy is certainly possible. But I notice you only allude to objective, dispassionate, organic (?) evidence. Care to actually provide it? Or are you not among those who "actually research and understand how to get to the most "objective source(s)"? Thanks for the good wishes, btw. That's the most important part... if your evidence or source is sprayed with pesticides how can you claim an untainted argument?
finn Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 37 minutes ago, Sherlock Holmes said: That's the most important part... if your evidence or source is sprayed with pesticides how can you claim an untainted argument? Or if it's a GMO, eh? 1
leonbus23 Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 (edited) Less of a conspiracy and more of a business plan to maximize profit. Stating that the success of a specific franchise is more profitable is not a conspiracy. This aim toward profit drives specific corporate interests and decisions. None of this is conspiracy (at least not in the colloquial use of the term). Edited November 30, 2019 by leonbus23
MJS Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 (edited) If there is bias, I don't think it is conspiracy. I think refs might have their own individual, sometimes subconscious biases. Most of the time I just think they screw up a call because they are human and subject to error. I've been watching football my whole life and haven't seen anything to suggest there is a league wide agenda. I mean, Pats fans believe the refs and league are out to get them too. Fans for EVERY SINGLE TEAM believe that for their own team. Cowboys fans believe that for their team. So if there is a conspiracy it is the refs conspiring against all teams. Edited November 30, 2019 by MJS 2
Rc2catch Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 1 hour ago, MattM said: LMAO—you pontificate one this issue as if you’re a pro, but yet can’t answer a simple question to name a single game they’ve lost on a bad call. I can name probable a dozen they’ve won that way—let’s see, we’ve got “just give it to them”, the Ravens Monday nighter in 2007 (in which there were multiple pro-Pats bad calls in the 4th quarter to allow a game- winning drive, so bad that several Ravens got fined for making comments about the refs, to the game one week later that year against the Giants for game 16 (30 yard penalty swing late when a Pat hit a Giants return man late and out of bounds, but the G-Men get the penalty, to the AFCCG vs the Colts where on successive plays in front of a ref Marcus Pollard was obviously held (the League changed a related rule the next year), to a personal favorite vs the Texans where late in the game Brady throws a late apparently game-sealing pick, but wait, wait, wait for it, there’s an incredibly late flag totally away from the play that the announcers couldn’t even understand, to this gem from a few years back vs the Saints— here’s a shot from the last play of the game where a Saint defender was clearly held as Brady threw the game-winning TD. All off the top of my head. Please provide a similar list of games they got jobbed on and which was controversial across the League, like all of those above were. I never said the pats or anyone lost any game over a bad call. Bad calls happen to every team. Brady is protected in lots of instances but so is Rodgers and Brees and the other top quarterbacks. These plays you highlight happen all the time and don’t get called. Favoritism happens in every sport when the top key players are involved. Lebron James lowers a shoulder like a safety and bulls over some poor defender and hits easy and 1 layups for his entire career and it’s never called a foul. Same stuff for Brady and Manning when he played and the list goes on. Cam Newton got slaughtered a few years ago and was on sports center every week taking late hits and hits to the head and no flags. Everyone knows the golden boys at quarterback in the NFL get those calls, Newton did not. Basically every company in this country has favoritism why would the NFL or NBA be so different in protecting what they consider to be their key pieces to success?
RaoulDuke79 Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 I believe when there is enough revenue streaming through any organization, there's also probably some shady ***** going on.
MattM Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 19 minutes ago, Rc2catch said: I never said the pats or anyone lost any game over a bad call. Bad calls happen to every team. Brady is protected in lots of instances but so is Rodgers and Brees and the other top quarterbacks. These plays you highlight happen all the time and don’t get called. Favoritism happens in every sport when the top key players are involved. Lebron James lowers a shoulder like a safety and bulls over some poor defender and hits easy and 1 layups for his entire career and it’s never called a foul. Same stuff for Brady and Manning when he played and the list goes on. Cam Newton got slaughtered a few years ago and was on sports center every week taking late hits and hits to the head and no flags. Everyone knows the golden boys at quarterback in the NFL get those calls, Newton did not. Basically every company in this country has favoritism why would the NFL or NBA be so different in protecting what they consider to be their key pieces to success? Please simply list examples of games they lost on League-wide controversial bad calls—it’s a very simple question. Off the top of my head I listed a whole bunch they won that way. If there was anything close to randomness involved here, it would even out, yet it doesn’t seem to when it comes to them. Remember, too, that we’re dealing with a team that has been caught cheating and pushing the envelope of acceptable behavior many, many times. If it’s simply “the Jordan effect”, please explain (a) why Peyton Manning didn’t seem to get a similar benefit of the doubt during his HOF career (in fact, one of the most egregious examples of multiple bad calls at the end of a game going New England’s way (the aforementioned 2004 AFCCG) came against Manning), and (b) why no other teams are known to get the benefit of calls anywhere near the level of New England (look no further than the cottage industry of “New England owns the refs“ memes that have cropped up over the last few years). Please be specific.
Formerly Allan in MD Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 (edited) Realistically, NFL referees have a long history of simply being either incompetent or inconsistent, or all of the above. That's why replays came into vogue. The true horror is the concern that some may be on the take as was the case with the NBA loser. Edited November 30, 2019 by Formerly Allan in MD
Rc2catch Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 44 minutes ago, MattM said: Please simply list examples of games they lost on League-wide controversial bad calls—it’s a very simple question. Off the top of my head I listed a whole bunch they won that way. If there was anything close to randomness involved here, it would even out, yet it doesn’t seem to when it comes to them. Remember, too, that we’re dealing with a team that has been caught cheating and pushing the envelope of acceptable behavior many, many times. If it’s simply “the Jordan effect”, please explain (a) why Peyton Manning didn’t seem to get a similar benefit of the doubt during his HOF career (in fact, one of the most egregious examples of multiple bad calls at the end of a game going New England’s way (the aforementioned 2004 AFCCG) came against Manning), and (b) why no other teams are known to get the benefit of calls anywhere near the level of New England (look no further than the cottage industry of “New England owns the refs“ memes that have cropped up over the last few years). Please be specific. I never claimed they lost games once again so there’s nothing to list. There is no legit cheating going on. There is too much to lose for everyone. 100’s of billions of dollars.. The NFL or even kraft would risk the insane yearly revenue stream? If a legit scam or cheat happened and the actual NFL and an owner is involved and planned it, it’s the end of the NFL. They would never survive. The criminal charges and media coverage would ruin the league not to mention the Vegas blowback. Why do they need to cheat? Is the LEAGUE’s bottom line that much higher with a patriot super bowl win than say Seattle? You could easily argue that for the league this season it would be much more profitable to get Kansas City or Baltimore in the Super Bowl over New England. So come playoff time will we see Jackson and mahomes get the elite quarterback treatment? Or they still favor Brady? Secrets can only stay secrets for so long, someone would talk. A bitter official, former disgruntled front office guy blackballed, the league has been out and out cheating for 20 years and nobody talks? Ever?
MattM Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 11 minutes ago, Rc2catch said: I never claimed they lost games once again so there’s nothing to list. There is no legit cheating going on. There is too much to lose for everyone. 100’s of billions of dollars.. The NFL or even kraft would risk the insane yearly revenue stream? If a legit scam or cheat happened and the actual NFL and an owner is involved and planned it, it’s the end of the NFL. They would never survive. The criminal charges and media coverage would ruin the league not to mention the Vegas blowback. Why do they need to cheat? Is the LEAGUE’s bottom line that much higher with a patriot super bowl win than say Seattle? You could easily argue that for the league this season it would be much more profitable to get Kansas City or Baltimore in the Super Bowl over New England. So come playoff time will we see Jackson and mahomes get the elite quarterback treatment? Or they still favor Brady? Secrets can only stay secrets for so long, someone would talk. A bitter official, former disgruntled front office guy blackballed, the league has been out and out cheating for 20 years and nobody talks? Ever? Let’s wait and see, shall we? Time may very well tell. Some of us just know what our eyes see, as noted above, and wonder why it never, ever seems to even out. Does that definitively mean that they’re cheating (yet again)? No, of course not. But to me at least, it plus all else we know about this team and its dirtbag owner means that the possibility of something untoward going on should not be shoved aside so easily. And BTW, it has happened already in other Leagues (NBA and Italy’s Serie A soccer league).
Augie Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 19 hours ago, Happy Gilmore said: I doubt it is fixed or influenced by certain teams or owners, as much as we like to pile on about Bob Kraft's checks clearing. This topic was mentioned a while back, where a poster(s) commented that the calls NE and Brady gets is similar to what the Bulls and Michael Jordan got back in the day. Jordan would travel and it would never get called. I just suspect that the NFL thinks that the Patriots and Tom Brady are good for the game, so they get favorable calls. It would also help if the game wasn't so technical, where every play could have a foul called. Let these guys play football more and officiate less. Games should not be decided by officials. Do away with that and many of the conspiracy theories go away. I don’t think it’s a conscious thing. “Jordan Rules” is the first thing that comes to mind when this topic comes up. They are human and don’t realize that there is at times an unintentional bias.
VW82 Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 (edited) Are there ever any actual league directives to help or hurt certain teams? I don't think so. Having said that, it's hard to rationalize an entire week's news cycle about how the Cowboys got screwed last week on dubious tripping calls and then proceed to get 4-5 highly questionable calls in their favour to start the Thanksgiving game. Refs are human and can be influenced even if it isn't by a direct order from the league office. Edited November 30, 2019 by VW82
Mr. WEO Posted November 30, 2019 Posted November 30, 2019 18 hours ago, klos63 said: When you make statements like that, it's hard to see how you maintain any credibility. This is true. Brady doesn't get the roughing the passer calls anywhere near where people here imagine. This has been shown over and over. The problem with this type of conspiracy is that one guy alone is unlikely to affect the outcome. Turnovers, scores, catches, first downs, now PI calls are reviewed. There are multiple refs on the field looking, generally, at the same thing. They would ALL have to be "in on it" for it to work the way many here imagine. Obviously that would be impossible to coordinate, for years, without getting caught.
davefan66 Posted December 1, 2019 Posted December 1, 2019 I’d like to believe if the refs really did throw games, we’d know. Thing is, there are plenty of things we don’t know that are much more sensitive than NFL games. I’d truly like to believe they are not paid off. But when you see NFL games where certain teams continually get drive saving flags and turnover saving flags, it makes you wonder. Think back to last years playoffs with the no flag PI, the “just give it to ‘em” Bills V Patsies, last weeks phantom “tripping” calls and just about any game the patsies play. One of the plays that gets me the most are holding calls after a good play...when holding can be called on just about every play. It may be established players get the benefit of a doubt, or simply the NFL does rig games to keep the more “popular” teams from losing. I mean the NFL would never rig anything, like contriving who the two teams are to move to a city that doesn’t support NFL teams....
theRalph Posted December 1, 2019 Posted December 1, 2019 Nothing organized I assure you. But always remember this tried and true adage: “Never attribute to treachery that which can be explained by incompetence.”
RobbRiddick Posted December 1, 2019 Posted December 1, 2019 I've spent time this season looking at forums of our opponents, and one thing they all have in common is a belief that the refs are out to get them. Just last week the cowboy fans were starting threads all over the place about being screwed over by the refs. It's like how you get convinced your own kids are getting harsher treatment by the teachers than all the others.
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