The fix was in and no one will EVER CONVINCE ME otherwise (1 Viewer)

[SuperSaint]

This will be my last post for a few days, I need to de-stress.

To begin, I take nothing away from the Cowboys. They played their guts out, especially on defense.

They employed a strategy used against the Saints before, most notably by Carolina a couple of years ago. That strategy is, interfere with the receivers on every play. Do whatever you have to do to stop them from catching the ball, and if you get called for a few penalties, that's just the cost of doing business. There's a term in psychology called the Normalcy Bias. If you see the same behavior repeated over and over, it will become the new norm, and the referees will change their internal definition of what constitutes interference.

Now, to my main point.

When the same official called Eli Apple for defensive holding in the first quarter THREE TIMES, I knew we were fighting more than just the Cowboys football team.

The helmet to helmet hit on Kirkwood wasn't called, and the one that concussed Alvin Kamara wasn't called, and it was the TEXTBOOK DEFINITION of targeting, and the ref was right in front of the play. I'm sure both Cowboys will get QUIETLY fined for both hits.

I won't say any more, I could write for 2 hours, but I would just get more upset. I take heart in the fact the Saints lost the last three games of the regular season in 2009, beginning with a loss at Dallas, and still won the Super Bowl, so it's just one game.

I hate the Cowboys.

 

[Black&Gold Knight]

I was begining to think these were the same guys that reff'ed the Texas A&M/LSU game. Well looks like Goodell got what he wanted. If we see the Cowgirls again in January it will be in our Dome and it will be a different story.

Joke could be on Jerry Jones.

 

[bouxdag]

Personally, I didn’t understand the hit on Arnold.

Either he had the time to catch it and make a football move, so therefor it was obviously a fumble.

Or he didn’t have time to catch it and he was defenseless, and obviously got hit in the head.

I don’t understand how they can initially call it the way the did.

 

[Doug B]

I don’t know about a fix. I do know that I don’t respect the Cowboys, and I don’t believe they’re better than the Saints in a tightly-called game.

 

[NewOrleansBoy]

Forgot to mention the clear 1.5 yards behind the 1st down marker by Beasley.

 

[TheSaints7]

There were horrible calls on both sides, we didn’t lose because of the refs.

 

[LiterOCola]

The game wasn’t fixed. The Saints got out gameplaned and out hustled. One team had energy, the other was asleep.

The refs weren’t good but both teams got calls. The refs practically marched the Saints down the field on one series.

 

[Saint Chi-Chi]

I was thinking the same as the game went on, there's a fix in place. I don't like to think this way but something just didn't feel right.
I went as far as stating Jerry made a phone call.

The officiating was bad for the Saints in the first half but spread out in the 2nd.

 

[jbourque]

There were missed calls on both sides and we benefited from calls that were questionable, as did Dallas.

This wasn’t fixed or on the refs. This was us getting outcoached and not being properly prepared to match their playoff intensity.

As much as I despised Lawrence’s comments he was right. They punched us in the mouth and played for 60mins.

 

[Swimmer]

There were horrible calls on both sides, we didn’t lose because of the refs.

This ^. That was about as poor officiating i've ever seen in a prime a prime time game

 

[GoldenSaint12]

Was this another "All-Star" crew like they had for Rams-Chiefs? Because they both were AWFUL and favored a certain team...and that certain team won both games.

 

[blackadder]

This will be my last post for a few days, I need to de-stress.

To begin, I take nothing away from the Cowboys. They played their guts out, especially on defense.

They employed a strategy used against the Saints before, most notably by Carolina a couple of years ago. That strategy is, interfere with the receivers on every play. Do whatever you have to do to stop them from catching the ball, and if you get called for a few penalties, that's just the cost of doing business. There's a term in psychology called the Normalcy Bias. If you see the same behavior repeated over and over, it will become the new norm, and the referees will change their internal definition of what constitutes interference.

Now, to my main point.

When the same official called Eli Apple for defensive holding in the first quarter THREE TIMES, I knew we were fighting more than just the Cowboys football team.

The helmet to helmet hit on Kirkwood wasn't called, and the one that concussed Alvin Kamara wasn't called, and it was the TEXTBOOK DEFINITION of targeting, and the ref was right in front of the play. I'm sure both Cowboys will get QUIETLY fined for both hits.

I won't say any more, I could write for 2 hours, but I would just get more upset. I take heart in the fact the Saints lost the last three games of the regular season in 2009, beginning with a loss at Dallas, and still won the Super Bowl, so it's just one game.

I hate the Cowboys.

You are correct.

We saw the home cooking bias coming. You could feel it.

But in spite of it there were chances to overcome, but the team just played too poorly too take advantage. In the moments when they could have taken back the game, they did just get beat. And the big story is...they got BEAT.

 

[NatureBoy]

The yellow line is obviously in the wrong spot.

 

[metalreb]

Didn’t the Cowboys have 4 or 5 defensive penalties on our lone touchdown drive? And on the touchdown itself Kirkwood clearly pushed off on the defender...the sheet officiating went both ways...

 

[LiterOCola]

The yellow line is obviously in the wrong spot.

They would have had a challenge available if Thomas didn’t convince Payton to challenge when he dropped the ball.