Tuesday, September 25, 2012

The One Where I Vow to Not Watch Another NFL Game

First things first. I'm not even going to talk about the play. You all know what happened. So, I said some things after last nights game. They involved profanity. A lot of it. I said I was done with the NFL. People thought I was joking or that I would "come to my senses" and be watching come Sunday. Well, I won't be. The NFL has showed that it doesn't care and so I'm showing that I don't care either.

I had issues sleeping, still angry over the whole thing. When I woke up this morning I still had a headache, but I had calmed down a bit. I realized that nothing would change last night but the NFL would at least apologize (ala the GB/Minny game a few years back) and it's a lot easier to handle mistakes when an honest apology is given. I also assumed that this would bring us closer to getting the real refs back.

I figured I could handle just watching GB games and boycotting the rest until the refs were back and football was football.

Instead we got the following statement:

In Monday's game between the Green Bay Packers and Seattle Seahawks, Seattle faced a 4th-and-10 from the Green Bay 24 with eight seconds remaining in the game.

Seattle quarterback Russell Wilson threw a pass into the end zone. Several players, including Seattle wide receiver Golden Tate and Green Bay safety M.D. Jennings, jumped into the air in an attempt to catch the ball.

While the ball is in the air, Tate can be seen shoving Green Bay cornerback Sam Shields to the ground. This should have been a penalty for offensive pass interference, which would have ended the game. It was not called and is not reviewable in instant replay.

When the players hit the ground in the end zone, the officials determined that both Tate and Jennings had possession of the ball. Under the rule for simultaneous catch, the ball belongs to Tate, the offensive player. The result of the play was a touchdown.

Replay Official Howard Slavin stopped the game for an instant replay review. The aspects of the play that were reviewable included if the ball hit the ground and who had possession of the ball. In the end zone, a ruling of a simultaneous catch is reviewable. That is not the case in the field of play, only in the end zone.

Referee Wayne Elliott determined that no indisputable visual evidence existed to overturn the call on the field, and as a result, the on-field ruling of touchdown stood. The NFL Officiating Department reviewed the video today and supports the decision not to overturn the on-field ruling following the instant replay review.

The result of the game is final.
This insults me. Nowhere do I see a "Sorry fans, we screwed the pooch on that one" all I see is "We don't care, people will still pay to see games and buy jerseys and eventually forget this one!" This lack of integrity is appalling to me. It just shows that the NFL is all about the bottom line, they are no longer concerned with the quality of their product or the safety of the players of the game. Will that change when the real refs come back? No it won't They'll still fine players for short socks or red undershirts when the team color is white all while not holding themselves accountable. Until the NFL can show me that they care about the product and the people more than the bottom line, I'm done.

It will be weird having my Sundays free. I already have some ideas on how to spend them though. I'm taking applications for a nice Premier League team to root on. I have a beautiful guitar my aunt left me several years ago (RIP Aunt Sally) that I promised myself I would learn to play. I also have two kids that don't get enough of their father's time thanks to his obsession with a certain oblong piece of pigskin.

In closing, I just wanted to say thank you to the Packers and their fans for a lot of great years. I hope you guys still make the playoffs. I hope you win it all. I hope that when the NFL changes its attitude and I come back to the sport that you'll have me back as a fan.


Sincerely,

Ken Leibee