Steelers win--with an asterisk

[Johnny O]

14. Any player who uses the top of his helmet unnecessarily. "

Did that happen? No, it didn't. The tackler, who was inbounds at initial contact by the way, didn't lead with his helmet, and didn't use it against the rules of the game.

I disagree. I think the helmet hit was unecessary, although probably unintentional. Shoulda been flagged.

The Seahawks played a far from perfect game, but they did play better then the Steelers.

I disagree. Although frankly I don't think the Steelers played all that well on offense.

With a lot of hurt players and starters on the bench, one might add.

Depth is part of the game and what makes good teams. Cry me a river.

2. Intentional grounding will be called when a passer, facing an imminent loss of yardage due to pressure from the defense, throws a forward pass without a realistic chance of completion."

As written, the two passes outof bounds were not illegal. No reciveres were open, but the QB wasn't under pressure; so, it is legal to throw the ball out of bounds.

I disagree and say that he was under pressure. If he wasn't, then why would he waste a down or not wait until someone was open or run? Or was no one open because on those plays, for a change, the Steelers had the receivers covered? Ergo, on those plays the Steeler D was better than the Seahawk O. Don't get me wrong, on all those 10 yard dink passes Hasslebeck was completing I'm screaming at the TV "Where's the friggen coverage???!!!" Further, the Hawks could move the ball downfield pretty good until they'd get inside about the 35 or so, then stall. Seemed like they tightened up.

Parts of the game were making me nuts too. :wacko: Why run Parker around the end when they're catching up with him? Not one of the Steelers' better efforts but the Seahawks were worse. Bettis had decent runs up the middle, which is what I thought they should've started out with.

Two other stats of note: Steelers have allowed one running back a 100 yard game in the last two years. Steelers are now 108-1-1 under Cowher when they lead by 10 points.

National sports media does not now, nor ever, liked the Steelers. We're used to it.

Might have been an ugly win, I'd prefer a 35-6 victory, but it wasn't an accident either.

I honestly never thought I'd see the day when Bill Cowher outcoached the likes of Mike Holmgren (I was kinda hoping player talent would carry the day) but it happened yesterday.

 

[Travis Munday]

I only mentioned the "injured players" but because you claim that:



"10. Stillers were 7-5 and 6th seed only because of a bad 3 game streak when key people were hurt. Talent-wise it is not a 6th seed team once everyone is healthy. Seahawks on the other hand played in a weak division, when they beat AFC teams the AFC team was either lousy, injured, or the coach's son had killed himself 3 days before."



You're right, depth is part of the game, and, through your own admission, it seems that is something Pittsburg lacks; as with hurt players, they lost three games. Meanwhile, the Seahawks, with hurt players, put up better stats then a squad of healthy Steelers; with their super-D, if we're to belive the hype.



Eye for an eye, afterall.

 

[Bill V]

National sports media does not now, nor ever, liked the Steelers. We're used to it.

You're kidding, right?? The media loves the Steelers! A good example is all the attention they've received the past two weeks, unlike the Seahawks. All you heard about was Bus, and Cowher, and Roethlisberger.



Don't get me wrong--I was cheering for the Steelers, and loved every minute of the coverage going that way. But to make a claim like that, you're truly living on another planet...

 

[Johnny O]

I don't disagree, but the Seahawks led in time of possession and yardage and still put up less points because while they could move the ball they couldn't close the deal with 7 but once.

An ugly win is still a win but I don't think most, if any, of the Seahawks penalties were undeserved. For example, the PI penalty in the end zone was legit although I thought the WR could have caught the ball anyway without interfering. Just turn and don't push off. Careless play on his part and it cost Seattle a TD. Couple other long passes by Hasslebeck but he was too close to the sideline and led the receivers out of bounds.

Put another way, if both teams were 100% and played their best and the officials were perfect I still think Pittsburgh would win because I think they have a stronger defense than Seattle's offense.

The MVP should be Dick LeBeau (Steelers defensive coodinator).

 

[Johnny O]

You're kidding, right?? The media loves the Steelers! A good example is all the attention they've received the past two weeks, unlike the Seahawks. All you heard about was Bus, and Cowher, and Roethlisberger.

That's why I split hairs and said sports media. The news media likes the Steelers because this year they made a good story. Most of the national sports media, including the TV announcers, never has.

 

[shawn stonbraker 2]

Tiger, you must be a Seahawks fan. To bad for you. it's either that or the steelers didn't cover your spread. Whatevr the case, the steelers won. If you think the Steelers had an easy road tp get there and didn't have bad calls made on them in the games before the Superbowl, then you haven't been paying attention. They had bad calls made against them and CAME OUT ON TOP!!! Just because your Seahawks decided to choke on all the calls instead of working through them, then in my opinion, they didn't need to be there. When a reciever pushes off the defenders chest it's pass interference. When the Ref was "running with one arm in the air to mark the ball instead of holding both arms up to signal touchdown", if you watched the reply, his other hand was messing around to put the whistle in his mouth and once there went up to signal a touchdown. Quit trying to take the air out of Pittsburgh's balloon and get over it.

 

[Travis Munday]

Stone, you must be a Steelers fan, as those blinders you're wearing are working pretty well.



For the record, I'm not a Seahawks fan, nor a Steelers fan, nor a betting fan. I enjoy a good football game, and the only people who thought was happened yesterday was a good football game are passive Steeler's fans, and people who won big by betting. The outrage displayed by nearly everyone over the debacle that went on yesterday should be obvious enough that the grievances posted here and elsewhere are not those of a few unhappy fans, but that there was a fundemental flaw in the officiating that went on.



Earlier in the year the NFL apologized to a team, although I forget which now, for a botched call that the referees made, I wonder if the NFL will do the same for the Seahawks?

 

[shawn stonbraker 2]

Yes I am a RABID Steelers fan. I'm not afraid to admit it. I do think the officiating has sucked bad this year. Will they apologize to Seattle for the Superbowl? No. It was just sounding like you were a Seahawks fan. I appologize if I offended you but I'm tierd of people trying to say the team that WON doesn't deserve it. Yeah, the calls were touchdown-killers, but they could have gone the other way also. When a man tucks his head to put his helmet into the back of another man's head it's "unnessessary roughness", it's not "there was no flag on the play" even though someone thought there should have been. What about the "Tucking" rule for the Pats a couple of years ago? It's not a perfect system, so teams should go into it knowing that and not be brought down by a bad call and sit there and go, "oh well, now we have something to blame it on".

 

[LB]

Just to add... ABC sports suck. Any football game (Super Bowl or regular season) will ALWAYS be better when broadcasted on FOX. FOX Sports outdoes any other sports programmer (except ESPN) in my opinion.



I'm probably biased, but FOX Sports outdoes any other sports broadcaster in graphics, audio quality, sports announcing, and overall filming of the game.



That's my 2 cents.

 

[Johnny O]

Earlier in the year the NFL apologized to a team, although I forget which now, for a botched call that the referees made, I wonder if the NFL will do the same for the Seahawks?

They did that for the Steelers after the Indy game, unless there's another incident I'm not aware of. We got robbed but still found a way to win. There were no flagrant errors by the officials (except for maybe non-calls) in the Super Bowl beyond what happens in a normal game. Supposedly the "best" officials get to do the SB, and I'll agree that that is a sad commentary on the current state of officiating. What that also means however is that often you get pickier officials working the SB, and in years past I've also seen stuff called that might slide by in the regular season. Depends who sees what I guess. As I recall even John Madden, who is no fan of the Steelers, was reduced to saying the PI call "was legit but not usually called". The NFL should definitely go to full-time officials who study the game and watch film daily instead of using weekend warriors.

Pittsburgh took advantage of opportunities, Seattle did not.



I thought that Terry Bradshaw not showing up for the MVP introductions, especially when it's his former team playing, was weak.

 

[Bill V]

stonemiser--



I waited to post this response until after I had a chance to see the replay of the Roethlisberger 'touchdown' again--not the close-up view that attempts to show whether the ball crossed the goal line, but the original, wider view that shows the actions of the referee. And after seeing it, I have to say that Tiger was wrong--you're not viewing things with blinders on. Instead, you're imagining things that clearly don't exist, simply to rationalize your out-of-touch-with-reality claims.



When the play in question was originally blown dead, the sideline official ran in to blow the play dead, with his right arm raised in the air the entire time to signal that he was stopped short of the goal. As he was running, his left arm was swinging by his side, bent, in a 'jogging' motion. When he got all the way in by the players, he changed his call, and raised the left arm as well to signal a touchdown. The hand never "was messing around to put the whistle in his mouth". It never got remotely close to his mouth. Or his pocket. Or a lanyard. It went straight from a running/swinging motion to a touchdown motion.



If your position on this is so weak that you feel the need to outright lie about it, maybe you need to try looking at it without your black-and-gold-colored glasses on...

 

[shawn stonbraker 2]

Bill V, spoken like a whining Seattle fan.

 

[Thomas Rogers]

Bill V...where was I wrong? Are you saying I said stone was viewing things with "Blinders on"? I didn't say that...maybe Tiger did.

 

[Bill V]

TJR--You're right, I meant Tiger. My apologies. I'll fix my earlier post.



stonemiser--Watch the replay. Then grab your foot, and insert firmly in your mouth.

 

[Johnny O]

About the way I described it. Shot of Ben's initial dive toward the goal line.



[Broken External Image]:



Ball crosses the line.

 

[Bill V]

In that shot? I don't think so! It's too fuzzy to be able to tell what is and isn't the ball. Not to mention that the superimposed black line obscures the view of where the goal line really is--in some places, you can even see "green" on the left side of that black line.



Don't get me wrong--I agree that that play is too close to be reversed on a replay. On that particular play, my beef is that the official called it down short of the goal line, and THEN reversed his call, just as he saw Roethlisberger push the ball forward well after he was flat on the ground. That original call should not be reversible.

 

[shawn stonbraker 2]

JohnnyO, we may as well give up. The Seattle Seahawks were such a SUPERIOR team that they only had the ball two times that whole game, and both times the refs ruined the drives for them. So they only had the ball a total of about 5 min. right. Oh wait, they did have the ball more times than that and couldn't do SQUAT with it. It just so happens they only THREATENED to score twice. My bad. Unfortunately, the Steelers didn't handle the ball well, but DID turn thier chances into points, all be it one a questionable call, no matter that the REF decided to call it a touchdown and there WASN'T enough evedence to OVERTURN it. I also didn't see any Steeler player over there egging the ref to call a touchdown, he did it on his own. Blinders on and lieing through my teeth, whatever, my foot isn't even close to my mouth. As "Q" says:

Q out.

 

[Thomas Rogers]

I think what your saying, Bill, is that IF the rev hadn't reversed himself (that whole awkward walking, he's down, no it's a TD move) then it would have been his original call that would have been contested, that original call being downed with inches, and then, there wouldn't have been enough to reverse that call. Because I think MOST agree that there wasn't enough shown on the replays to call it definitively one way or the other, so the original call had to stand. It was the original call and its "rethinking" that seemed to be the big error. When it comes to TDs it seems to me you should err on the side of caution (e.g. NOT being a TD than being one).



BTW, I don't give a crap which team won...then or now.

 

[Travis Munday]

TJR-

In fact, that how most rules are written in the NFL. If there is a doubt, then there is no foul, TD, etc.



Either way, it was just one of the many flub ups by a inferior officiating crew.

 

[Bill V]

Thank you TJR. At least one person in here isn't completely blinded by their support of a team. Stonemiser is so completely clueless he actually thinks I support the Seahawks, which in this game couldn't be further from the truth. But as a Steelers fan, I want the team to win completely on the up-and-up, and I feel that it was my team--the STEELERS--that was cheated out of that opportunity by the pathetic officiating.