Tinfoil hat poll

Maybe I'm naive but I have a hard time swallowing the idea that refs would bias their calls to have, for example, a Brady/Manning AFC Championship. I have an easy time believing that refs could bias themselves based on pre-conceived notions of how a team does or should behave but there have been enough non-calls this season for me to be dubious about that. At the end I think reffing is obviously very subjective but I'm not sure I buy into conscious bias. What do you think?

"Conscious" is the key word here IMO.

Obviously feel free to add other responses as you see fit.

 

If you want to see BIASED officiating look at the Steelers vs Colts playoff game back in the '05 season. Not just the highlights but the whole game. At one point in this game we have the ball, and before the snap one of the colts jumps offsides and the refs throw the flag and blow the play dead. Now they do not have instant replay to look at in this case so they have to make a call based solely on what they saw.

One of our o-lineman's leg flinched and that is what caused the colts to jump or so it is believed. Well apparently they did not see our guy flinch, but they did see the offsides. Rather than make a call they rule a...do over!!! SERIOUSLY???

Later in that same game Troy intercepts Peyton he falls to the ground and then gets up un touched. In the process his knee knocks the ball out of his hand which Troy promptly jumps on. Ruling on the field is Steelers ball. Dungy throws the challenge play as this is the season no big deal...except when we come back from the break they ruled incomplete pass. The NFL actually apologized to us the next day saying that call was wrong and it could have easily come back to cost us the game.

Now all that being said I will never blame the refs for costing us a game. Great teams over come bad officials. Do they decide game? Damn straight they do. Do I believe they do it on purpose? Damn straight there are some crooked ones out there and not just football in all sports. Do I think they are human and going to miss some calls? again yes I do. It runs the gammit

 

I went with the "pre-conceived" how else to explain how defenses never get called for hits on Ben, but if you get within three yards of Brady or Manning it's a fifteen yard penalty

 

Actually I think all of them are true. I think the Patriots usually get away with a lot, so I think they want the Patriots to have an advantage most of the time.
I'm not a Bengals fan so I'm not going to sit here & say that the refs are always against the Steelers because I don't think they are. I think there are time they watch some of our players a little more than others.
IMO, it all depends on who the officials are, which teams are playing, and where the game is being played.

 

I went with pretty good job. I don't think anyone realizes the speed at which games are played and how difficult it is to make a snap decision and get it right every time.

That being said, never fear because word out of Cincinnati is that there may soon be a class action lawsuit against Ryan Shazier and the NFL that is going to expose the NFL . You cannot make this stuff up, I kid you not.....

 

Cmon people. This kind of thinking is for lesser mortals...not Steeler fans.

 

Next year starts Flag Football.

 

There are some paranoid beings in this universe.

 

So... the ref never told Cam Newton "You're not old enough to get those calls"?

Because to me that is bias.

 

The lunatic is on the grass...

 

I do not think refs intentionally call games in one team's favor directly.

I strongly feel that star players in all sports get special treatment. Jordan and Kobe in the NBA, Brady and Sherman in the NFL, Crosby and Subban in the NHL. Those calls indirectly affect the outcomes of games.

Ben doesn't get the calls because he is perceived as big and tough and not needing protection not because the refs want the Steelers to lose.

Players like Sherman and Hines knew how to get calls. That can look like bias.

Refs have it harder than ever now that catches and hits are so subjective.

Refs are EXPECTED to make game changing decisions every game.

It is mostly on NFL offices IMO.

 

Agreed.

I'm assuming in the second to last line "Expected" is meant along with accurately, to the best of their ability?

 

Like in the last game the refs got the hit by Williams on Wheaton wrong. It was shoulder to shoulder with zero head contact by either player... but it looked bad. The refs felt they should call it due to the NFL cracking down on hits to "defenseless receivers."

The refs also seemed to feel the Steelers were antagonizing the Bengals coming into the game. They seemed to take a "don't make the thugs mad" approach.

It's the only way I can process Foster getting 15 yards for being spiked by Burfict and Munchak getting shoved twice for 15 yards with no offsetting penalty.

 

I think the refs struggle with the ambiguous rules on what's a catch, what's worthy of a 15 yard penalty on a hit etc. Beyond that I do think that some of the officials are too old to keep up with the speed of the game. It ultimately falls on the NFL owners who are too cheap to pay for full-time officials.