Yeah, I know it wasn’t fixed. It is fun to talk about and it doesn’t change the fact that there have been plenty of times where it has. The worst one was Wisconsin rolling over for Ohio State in last years Big 10 championship so the Buckeyes could be a shoe in for the national championship tournament.
I’ll just go with SR’s take that it was not only the wrong call, in so many ways, it was absolutely the dumbest call I’ve seen this year. If BYU had done something like that (Anae makes the call) then I would be more apt to understand it but Harbaugh is supposed to be this genius coach and he looked like an amateur making that call.
That is why it was so suspect… that combined with what actually happened during the play. It was one of the worst ever.
Meh, had the punter caught the ball, he would have gotten it away. Somewhat low snap. Punter was peaking at the rush since 11 were on the line. A time out would have been appropriate to make sure all 11 are being blocked.
I do t think taking a snap and owning it there was right either since it would give MSU a possible chance to move the ball into field goal range with a quick pass. Or a Hail Mary.
Perhaps even running around for some time and then throwing it high and deep to run the clock out. But there are too many things that can go wrong doing that. That’s why a time out to make sure all are being blocked on the punt and to remind the punter if he does fumble to just fall on it and hope for the best.
That too. I don’t have an issue with Harbaugh’s call to punt. I do think he needed to make sure all defenders were accounted for and to remind the punter if there is an errant snap or fumble to fall on the ball in that case.
You have 10 seconds-taking a knee wouldn’t have been a good call as it might have given them two plays. Running a sweep runs at least 6 seconds off the clock and even a possible first down. Problem with the punt is that there is nobody but MSU players after the block- if they could have tackled the guy before he scores-game over Michigan wins-but that situation dictated that block the ball and u have a good chance of picking it up and scoring. It’s exactly the reason if you are up by 3 with little time left in the game and close to the end zone u take the safety and don’t ever punt the ball-ever. Imo there was no way he was getting the punt off-three guys untouched from the right side-done deal
That’s why I said he needed to take the time out. Make sure the players are covered. Punting the ball out of bounds at the 20 would have been a really great idea. A quick kick possibility too.
All the punter had to do was field the snap and get the kick off. Maybe it gets blocked anyway if he fields the snap but more often than not it doesn’t. If he fields the snap and kicks the ball we aren’t having this conversation. Even if he had fallen on the ball after bobbling the snap odds are Michigan still wins because a Hail Mary from around 40 yards out is still a low percentage play. If he had fallen on the ball MSU would have had time for one play, a Hail Mary or a field goal attempt. The field goal would have been a very long one. I don’t think the punt was a bad call. The punter just choked. Its one of those things that happens on occasion there was no fix. MSU just got lucky and the better team lost.
Absolutely 100% correct! He panics and makes it worse. This isn’t wrestling and the conspiracy nuts just want to think something is there when it isn’t. No UFOs!
What do ya mean, no UFOs. My wife and I had a fun and interesting ride on an alien spaceship to Alpha Centuri. The people there are sweethearts. The round trip took 5 days. Their technology is awesome. The aliens have it in with the Big 10 and fixed the outcome, just like Jim said.
Now that they have become irrelevant with two losses, nothing they do matters.
They have given up 26 pts. to the big 10 powerhouse Minnesota. So where is their awesome defense? We all know BYU pulled the annual mid-season choke/no show performance and then everyone used the “michigan has a great d” excuse to somehow say it was okay.
Update - Is every team in the big 10 a bunch of idiots? Minnesota goes to the 1/2 yard line with 19 seconds left and then they spend 17 seconds running a play, shifting into pass formation and basically blowing the game. With two seconds left they run a qb sneak and get stopped short. I swear I have never seen such idiotic coaching that I can remember…
Why are you asking me the question? A question that I already answered in my previous post. There is no reason to fix anything because what they do going forward is irrelevant.
The only teams that can be helped with beneficial calls and biased officiating are the highly ranked teams from the p-5 conferences, like Stanford was last night. In spite of the fact that WSU had a chance to win the game on a last second field goal, Stanford was getting bogus calls all game long. The worst one came as WSU was building momentum with a 22-10 lead and the Stanford RB clearly fumbled but the call of being out of bounds was upheld. It was obvious that he had fumbled prior to going out. As a result Stanford kept the ball and scored and eventually took the lead and won the game.
This is not an example of a “fix”, it was just a case of one team using biased officiating to their advantage and helping them win a game in which they were clearly outplayed. That is the problem with all of this bogus p-5 and playoff-national champion nonsense.
Harbaugh gets extremely fortunate-really is Michigan an institution of higher learning? I felt bad for WSU and Minnesota-they both played inspired football games and WSU’s program looks like it’s on the upswing
The play was reviewed and agreed on. The problem with your theory is that officials would need to be absolutely perfect human beings and never make mistakes. As you learned, officiating is not perfect and never will be. The only one who is perfect apparently is you.
Actually Michigan does have a great defense. They had 2 shutouts in a row after us and one of them was against a ranked team at the time, Northwestern. Saturday they were probably still a bit hung over after the shocking loss to Michigan St. Minnesota I believe was playing for a coach that was sick or something like that. Teams can be terrific one week and not so hot the next. We are talking about 18-21 year old kids in most cases and strange things happen. Texas beat Oklahoma several weeks ago. Oklahoma is close to being a top ten team and Texas beat them but they were shutout by a bad Iowa St. team 24-0 Saturday night and looked like one of the worst teams in college football. Every week is a new week and teams better be ready to play every week.
When Michigan played us they were terrific on defense and they had a five game run after they lost to Utah where they only allowed 13 points. They had 3 straight shutouts. You can’t take one game and use that as a measuring stick and then throw out the whole body of work.
The original call was not a “bad” call and certainly showed that no official is perfect and they do the best they can. The play was “reviewed” and it was agreed that giving the ball to WSU might have spelled doom for Stanford at that point in the game, so they ruled against the obvious that had taken place. He lost the ball while he was still in bounds, everyone knew that and the announcers said as much.
The fact that WSU had a chance to win the game shows that there was no fix involved, just some convenient officiating at key times that helped Stanford come out on top.
I don’t want to take the time to refute these comments but I could do it by comparing other scores/games. Fortunately I respect your opinions so there is no point in pursuing that endeavor.
However I can say that my original comment stands in that once Michigan rolled over at the end of the Michigan State game (something that ALL of the big 10 teams have agreed to do when they play Michigan State this year) they became irrelevant. So, in reality, the Minnesota debacle didn’t matter one way or the other. Yeah, they still have a good defense as long as the officials allow them to play it the way they do… it’s called bending the rules or tailoring the game to favor one team or the other. BYU had no excuse for not showing up but maybe it would not have mattered because the Michigan defense is so good - when big 10 officials are calling a “relevant” game.
That was my point all along. The comments about their great defense were a side note.