Monday, December 17, 2001
AT LEAST THEY WERE PLASTIC BEER BOTTLES --- A NawFuL DAY IN CLEVELAND
The split that got away: Jacksonville at Cleveland.
In case you missed it (I don't know how), Cleveland was driving for the potential winning score with less than a minute left. Tim Couch completed a pass on fourth down, then quickly set up the next play and spiked the ball. THEN the officials decided to review the reception, even though another play had already been allowed to transpire. The reception was overturned... Jacksonville's ball... then the beer bottles began to rain down from the stands onto the field. The officials cancelled the last forty plus seconds of the game and ran for their lives towards the tunnel as fans pelted them with any objects within arms reach. Thirty minutes after the fact, the NawFuL commisioner called and told the officials, cowering in the bowels of the stadium, that the last few seconds still had to be played. The teams and officials retook the field just long enough for two Jacksonville kneel downs and some more pot shots at the officials thrown by the remaining 5000 fans waiting by the tunnel.
This officiating blunder has got to go down in the Football Hall of Shame. The only thing I can compare it to is when a ref gave a team an extra down (5 downs) which allowed them to get the winning score. The officials' excuse in the Cleveland game was that they had been buzzed by the replay official just as the next play was starting. If that was case they should have blown a whistle stopping the play before it was allowed to conclude. You CANNOT review a play after another one has transpired! How hard is that to understand! I still think the argument could be made that there wasn't sufficient evidence to overturn the original call, but it should never even have come to that.
The officials are just lucky this didn't happen a few years ago when the beer bottles were still made of glass!
Junior Bro 12:14:00 PM
|
|
