A group of my college friends have been getting together for a game once a year. This year our choices were limited so we chose NOv 19. They posted it as a noon game, then TBD, then noon, and today they announced that they’ll tell us on Nov 13 which time we’ll start, because they are waiting to see who wins this Saturday. If ESPN picks it, it will be at 8:15 pm. If FoxSports, at 1:30. If neither picks us, it will go to the Pac12 network and will be at noon, 3:30, or 8:30. We just want to tailgate a little, watch a game (sunshine would be nice), walk around the old campus, and go out to dinner. We are too old to be watching a game at almost midnight (drinking is no longer allowed in the stands).
I didn’t watch the game, but I saw it on replay (the incident with Sherman). Technically if the player gets his hand on the ball and then runs into the kicker, it is not roughing, and Sherman got his hand on the ball. The real villain here were the refs,Sherman was so early that he reached the kicker with the ball still on the ground, and when a player jumps offsides like that the refs are supposed to blow the play dead, and they didn’t. I am not necessarily a fan of Sherman and some of the things he does, but players are taught to keep playing until they hear the whistle, and Sherman did in this case. I don’t think Sherman should be fined, it wasn’t a dirty hit, his intent was not to hurt Carpenter, and the fact that he was offsides like that is simply that, offsides.
The reffing is out of hand, it is as bad as I have seen it, they have taken away the game and filled it full of penalties, this reminds me of one of those British card games where half the game seems to revolve around finding others violating the rules and getting points for doing so blah. They have made it so the secondary can’t even bump into a receiver without it being flagged, I see roughing calls when a QB dumps the ball and gets hit a split second later, I fully sympathize with trying to protect players but this has turned into a game controlled and determined by the refs. I did enough refereeing that I attended more than a few clinics on it, and one thing they tried to tell us was that if at all possible, let the teams play, that if calls are borderline (like handfighting between a receiver and db), let it go, let the game play out, and only call penalties where it is totally clear. Besides the general lousy level of the games (and this year the best description of most of the NFL is mediocre, besides my beloved Jets who are deliciously lousy), the reffing has changed the shape of the game and made it into a snooze fest. Either they are being giving weird instructions, or the refs have decided they are the stars of the game, whatever it is, the games are pretty poorly reffed.
I am excited, the Jets lost to the Rams, I am hoping if it gets really bad Woody Johnson might wake up from celebrating Trump’s victory to actually notice his team is a piece of dung… (this is how Jets fans survive so many years of bad teams, we find solace even in terrible teams). Unfortunately, my bet is Bowles and McCegney are going to be allowed to stay for several more years of misery, until Woody figures out that coaching teams to 8-8 is not good coaching or personnel. There are some glimmers with the Jets, the kid Robbie Anderson is looking like he may be a star, Enumwa looks good if they throw to him, the real problem is the coaching, Ray Lucas was living on the post game show that the Jets basically kept Petty under wraps and didn’t let him do anything. Given that even if they won the game it was meaningless, why not let the kid take his lumps and actually try to win the game?
The Patriots no longer have a Superbowl-caliber defense IMO. IBWT and all that but you can’t dump two of your best players with no one that can step in and perform at a high level to replace them, and expect your defense to come up big when needed.
Does any team get away with as much defense holding as Seattle? They’ve figured out that the refs won’t call it on every single play, so they do it on everysingleplay. Including the last play, with the ref staring right at it.
And while I’m ranting, wth is up the RedZone spending 80% of the time on the boring Arizona/SF game instead of focusing on Dallas/Pittsburgh? Are they trying to protect the network’s ratings? What is the point of the channel then? I guess it worked, because I kept flicking from the RZ to whatever channel the game was on.
And I am so sick of the “give a car for Christmas” campaigns, just give it a rest already! No one buys cars for Christmas presents! It’s still 10 days to Thanksgiving and I’m already tired of the Christmas ads. It almost makes me miss the political ads. Ok, not really.
Seattle gets away with a lot, I would have loved to See Gronkowski get pissed off at Sherman or Chancellor and ripped their arm off for holding him lol. NE is showing weakness, I was really surprised Seattle’s O was able to do what they were, Wilson looks a lot more mobile, but they still were not a great O most of the season.
Looking at the games yesterday, it was amazing how few of them were interesting games. Dallas Pittsburgh was, NE Seattle was, but most of the rest looked mediocre to me (obviously, didn’t watch more than a fraction of the games, I don’t have Sunday ticket). KC and Texans seemed like snoozefest (KC’s offense as a fan is boring, to say the least, Alex Smith in my book is a modern day Trent Dilfer), and the rest just looked shoddy. I think last night’s game was one of the few Sunday night games worth watching in recent history. Tonight’s game is again two struggling teams, kind of wonder outside Giants and Cincy fans who will watch (yes, it has meaning, both still could make the playoffs, Giants more likely than Cincy, but still…).
The NFL team H follows isn’t in our area. Same with Hockey. But H goes out of his way to find his hockey team broadcasts (different thread). Not so much for football. On the college level, he does like the Cornhuskers and Horned Frogs.
We like to watch Army football games, given the nature of the military academies they can’t recruit the way the big football teams do, so it is very much like looking at football a long time ago. Plus my wife and I enjoy watching the Army cheerleaders and cadets doing pushups every time army scores (they do as many pushups as points), their cheerleaders are in great shape! And being their live is great, especially when they shoot off the howitzer when they score a touchdown. This year is especially cool, they have a player (I kid you not) named Edgar Allen Poe! We are going to see them next weekend live.
Wow, some poor time clock management by Tampa Bay at the end of the first half. Hope that three points they missed out on doesn’t come back to bite them.
Our cadet reports that if Army beats Navy, in addition to hell freezing over, the Corps gets an extra week of Christmas vacation. I don’t follow football much, but I’ll be praying over this game.
(this is how Jets fans survive so many years of bad teams, we find solace even in terrible teams). Unfortunately, my bet is Bowles and McCegney are going to be allowed to stay for several more years of misery, until Woody figures out that coaching teams to 8-8 is not good coaching or personnel. There are some glimmers with the Jets, the kid Robbie Anderson is looking like he may be a star, Enumwa looks good if they throw to him, the real problem is the coaching, Ray Lucas was living on the post game show that the Jets basically kept Petty under wraps and didn’t let him do anything. Given that even if they won the game it was meaningless, why not let the kid take his lumps and actually try to win the game?