Vic Wharton tweet says refs from last night got suspended
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Morpheus
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The bottom line for me is not that we should have won the game. I think Vandy deserved to win. My problem is the continuing creative interpretation of the rules by officials calling our games.
The problem I have with the overturned Pig catch is that the rule, I feel, is purposely left vague so that officials can apply their own interpretation, rather than having concrete indisputable and objective criteria to follow. The first rule of football is that the play is dead once the ball is outside the boundaries of the playing field. So if a player catches a pass inbounds, controls the ball the entire time he is in bounds, why would it matter if the ball moves slightly in his hands when he is out of bounds and the play is dead? When Pigs foot touched the turf out of bounds, the play was dead, yet an almost imperceivable shift of the ball after the play was dead was enough to rule everything that happened in bounds (while the play was live) meaningless. How does that make sense?
But then the same rule applied to the Florida receiver who "caught" a pass in the end zone a few years ago, was awarded a TD because he "controlled" it for a microsecond before he dropped it. Where's the consistency? The only consistency I see is that UT was hurt by both interpretations of the rules.
As far as the overturn of the Vandy 4th down play, although probably the correct call based on the push they got, it was obviously not conclusive as to the position of the ball on replay. If I had a dollar for every time I've seen a play that looked obvious on replay not get overturned because of some technicality like the view of the ball was obstructed, I'd be able to retire soon. But again, this call was inconsistent with history. There's one regular season week of games left, and I'd be willing to bet we see a similar play happen where they say, "well it appears to be such and such, but you can't see the ball on replay so they can't overturn the call on the field". Just wait and see.
Again, my problem is not that the vols lost, they deserved to lose, IMO. My problem is the inconstant interpretation of rules that consistently seems to leave the vols on the short end of the stick. This is an indisputable pattern.
Here are just a few of the precedents set by officials calling vols games over the past few years
1. Eric Berry intercepts a pass in OT against Kentucky in 2007, appears to be on his way to ending the game by returning it for 6, until a UK player lunges to grab his face mask, nearly taking his head off in the open field for all the world to see. What's the ruling? No penalty. Supposedly face masks are legal in OT (as explained by the ref), but only for that game.
2. LSU in 2010. In my 40 some odd years of watching football, I've never seen an official walk up to face the crowd and pronounce "the game is over", the players exiting the field, fans leaving the stadium, and then boom. "wait, we found something on the replay". Yes the vols had too many on the field, and yes they deserved to lose the game, but I've never seen anything like that before or since. I have seen many instances of the game being declared over, and then found something that was missed that would have changed the outcome, but in every case, too bad, game's over.
3. Again in 2010 against UNC, there's a whole serious of mysterious calls in the final 30 seconds of the game, starting with the "launching" penalty against UT on a desperation pass down field. I've watched a lot of football, but never before or since have I seen or heard of this "launching" penalty. It was a perfectly routine play by a DB trying to dislodge the ball from the receiver, seen a hundred times a week at least. He led with his shoulder, not his head, hit the guy in his side, not his head, perfectly legal play any other game. I won't detail the rest, everyone knows the rest of the bizarre calls that basically handed UNC the game.
I'll stop there to keep from writing a book but there are plenty of other examples. My point is there is a consistent pattern of these strange calls with uniques interpretations isolated in UT games over the past few years. This is far more troubling to me than the fact the vols currently have little talent. The most talented teams don't always win, but a blackballed team almost never does when it really matters.
its funny, I used to feel bad for vandy. For years they got screwed by officiating, and even tho they generally sucked, there were a bunch of games they could have won if not for bad calls late in the game. And there were a bunch of games we probably would have lost in our heydays, if not for help from the refs. But i's obvious to me the tables have been turned, and vol fans are going to have to get used to being the vandy of the foreseeable future. Somewhere along the way, we've made enemies in the sec/ncaa offices, IMO.
Sorry so long.
The problem I have with the overturned Pig catch is that the rule, I feel, is purposely left vague so that officials can apply their own interpretation, rather than having concrete indisputable and objective criteria to follow. The first rule of football is that the play is dead once the ball is outside the boundaries of the playing field. So if a player catches a pass inbounds, controls the ball the entire time he is in bounds, why would it matter if the ball moves slightly in his hands when he is out of bounds and the play is dead? When Pigs foot touched the turf out of bounds, the play was dead, yet an almost imperceivable shift of the ball after the play was dead was enough to rule everything that happened in bounds (while the play was live) meaningless. How does that make sense?
But then the same rule applied to the Florida receiver who "caught" a pass in the end zone a few years ago, was awarded a TD because he "controlled" it for a microsecond before he dropped it. Where's the consistency? The only consistency I see is that UT was hurt by both interpretations of the rules.
As far as the overturn of the Vandy 4th down play, although probably the correct call based on the push they got, it was obviously not conclusive as to the position of the ball on replay. If I had a dollar for every time I've seen a play that looked obvious on replay not get overturned because of some technicality like the view of the ball was obstructed, I'd be able to retire soon. But again, this call was inconsistent with history. There's one regular season week of games left, and I'd be willing to bet we see a similar play happen where they say, "well it appears to be such and such, but you can't see the ball on replay so they can't overturn the call on the field". Just wait and see.
Again, my problem is not that the vols lost, they deserved to lose, IMO. My problem is the inconstant interpretation of rules that consistently seems to leave the vols on the short end of the stick. This is an indisputable pattern.
Here are just a few of the precedents set by officials calling vols games over the past few years
1. Eric Berry intercepts a pass in OT against Kentucky in 2007, appears to be on his way to ending the game by returning it for 6, until a UK player lunges to grab his face mask, nearly taking his head off in the open field for all the world to see. What's the ruling? No penalty. Supposedly face masks are legal in OT (as explained by the ref), but only for that game.
2. LSU in 2010. In my 40 some odd years of watching football, I've never seen an official walk up to face the crowd and pronounce "the game is over", the players exiting the field, fans leaving the stadium, and then boom. "wait, we found something on the replay". Yes the vols had too many on the field, and yes they deserved to lose the game, but I've never seen anything like that before or since. I have seen many instances of the game being declared over, and then found something that was missed that would have changed the outcome, but in every case, too bad, game's over.
3. Again in 2010 against UNC, there's a whole serious of mysterious calls in the final 30 seconds of the game, starting with the "launching" penalty against UT on a desperation pass down field. I've watched a lot of football, but never before or since have I seen or heard of this "launching" penalty. It was a perfectly routine play by a DB trying to dislodge the ball from the receiver, seen a hundred times a week at least. He led with his shoulder, not his head, hit the guy in his side, not his head, perfectly legal play any other game. I won't detail the rest, everyone knows the rest of the bizarre calls that basically handed UNC the game.
I'll stop there to keep from writing a book but there are plenty of other examples. My point is there is a consistent pattern of these strange calls with uniques interpretations isolated in UT games over the past few years. This is far more troubling to me than the fact the vols currently have little talent. The most talented teams don't always win, but a blackballed team almost never does when it really matters.
its funny, I used to feel bad for vandy. For years they got screwed by officiating, and even tho they generally sucked, there were a bunch of games they could have won if not for bad calls late in the game. And there were a bunch of games we probably would have lost in our heydays, if not for help from the refs. But i's obvious to me the tables have been turned, and vol fans are going to have to get used to being the vandy of the foreseeable future. Somewhere along the way, we've made enemies in the sec/ncaa offices, IMO.
Sorry so long.
JohnnyBall
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dreVol
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