Dude, I like you, but as a Pats fan you really need to stop commenting on our officiating issues.
We played awful but we rallied and came back. Two successive plays gave Jax the lead back and ultimately the win. Phantom PI and non-call Hughes holding which led to a TD. Name one other team that has announcer s openly questioning HUGE calls every game!?
It's most certainly not every game, and if you watch losing team's games, almost the same thing happens. The Bucs literally had like 5 wins stolen from them last year but iffy officiating; it's the only reason they were able to get Jameis.
It really is crazy, I mean, he didn't even touch him!? I literally don't understand how you, as a ref, can be that absurdly incompetent to blow such a huge call. He didn't even just miss a huge call, this POS went out and created PI on a zero contact play with an uncatchable ball out of thin air. It's so out of control bad that even I start to wonder if the ish was scripted.
I've only seen the play from the three angles (1. TV angle; 2. zoomed in angle looking down the field; 3. zoomed in angle behind Walters and Robey), but you can't tell from any of them if Robey pushes him or not. I think Mike Pereira (who disagreed with the call as well) was saying that pushing with your shoulder the way Robey may have (hard to tell from the angle) is only a foul if you're pushing through their back rather than against the shoulder. From the ref's angle, who was looking down the field rather than watching from behind, he may have thought Robey was pushing through Walters' back as the play was happening in full speed. Whereas from the angle where the camera is behind the play, you can tell in slow motion that any pushing was shoulder to shoulder, and therefore, it should have gone uncalled, but unfortunately, that isn't the angle that the ref had.
The only way that someone can think this was the worst call of all-time is if this was the only football game they've ever watched.
At the end of the day, it sucks to lose a game as close as this one when a call like that goes against you, but the officiating was still just a small reason for the loss. The defense once again struggled, EJ personally handed Jacksonville 14 points, McCoy's fumbled at the goal line, etc. Those were all much larger reasons for the loss.
Edit: The hold on the winning touchdown, however, was indefensible. I don't know how that call could have been missed unless a ref just flat out wasn't watching the offensive line.
