“Bad Rule. Right Call.” Bull Shit.
Why the Dez Bryant Call Was the Dumbest in NFL History
January 14, 2015
When Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Dez Bryant caught the ball on Sunday to the wonder of millions of NFL fans (Packers-fans justly excluded), we all knew we had seen something special. Fourth and two at the thirty yard line, down by five, four minutes left in the game. The Cowboys actually went for it. Tony Romo tossed up a prayer to Bryant, who made a remarkable superhuman catch inside the one yard line. Cowboy-haters and Cowboy-lovers alike (i.e., everyone) knew they had just seen a Great play. It’s the reason we watch this game. The ruling on the field was a completion and the Cowboys were in prime position for the go-ahead score. A classic, hard-fought game had just become more Classic. What more could football fans want?
And then the officials completely fucked it up beyond belief.
Packers head coach Mike McCarthy threw the red challenge flag. What did he have to lose? Troy Aikman and Joe Buck, two generally respected football men, one a Hall of Fame three-time Champion, took us to the commercial break almost confused at why there was a red piece of fabric lying on the mud at Lambeau Field. As a lifelong fan of this sport, I thought McCarthy had just squandered a valuable time out. There were still four minutes left to play, after all.
Coming out of commercial, Buck explained that there was a “debate among the guys in the booth” as to whether the play would be upheld. Soon after, referee Gene Steratore strutted out to the middle of the field and announced that, upon further review, the play was being reversed. Incomplete pass. Every right-thinking NFL fan at that moment was thinking the same thing: What. The. Fuck. Just. Happened. Dez Bryant had an expression on his face like he had just witnessed Zeus fuck a chicken.
The game continued, although I know many Cowboys fans who simply turned off their TVs at that moment. It was too painful. Too confusing. The call had just ended the competition. The Dallas defense walked onto the field as if they were forced to play over the carcasses of their murdered pets. They knew in their hearts that the game was over. Aaron Rodgers made sure of it.
The Aftermath
In the days that followed, there has been an attempt to discuss, debate and defend the ruling of the officials that day. At this moment, there seems to be a consensus developing, which can be summarized as follows: there is a really bad rule in the NFL called the “Calvin Johnson Rule,” which rule squarely applies to this play. “Like the rule or hate the rule,” as the refrain goes, the play was correctly ruled an incomplete pass. Bad rule. Right result. The lead spokesperson for this school of thought is FOX rules analysis and former Vice President of Officiating, Mike Pereira, who ably describes for America each week why NFL referees do the asinine things we see each game. (It’s a noble profession, akin to being Joseph Stalin’s press secretary.) On Sunday, Pereira’s mug appeared on my television multiple times to explain why the officials did what they did. “Like the rule or hate the rule,” it was the right call.
Never has a bigger load of horseshit been foisted upon the sports-loving American people.
You see, by Pereira blaming the rule instead of the officials, he is trying to assuage that feeling of confusion, vague and (for Cowboys fans) rage that is still there for most of us even days later. It makes us accept the world as rational and just, rather than random and unjust, even though we know in hearts that we have just witnessed what seems like the latter. Pereira’s approach seeks to absolve the in-game decisions of Gene Steratore, the other officials on the field and the “team of officials in New York,” who are consulted on each booth review. The thinking today is that these guys did their jobs because they had no choice under the rule. In other words, this explanation gives the American people the completely false notion that the officials have the slightest fucking idea what they’re doing. News flash – they don’t.
The Play
Dez Bryant leaps up and catches the ball in his giant hands – a vice grip around the ball. He takes three steps forward towards the end zone, switches the ball to his left hand and outstretches that hand with the ball as he tries to break the plane of the end zone. As he lunges, the arm with the ball hits the ground (along with his knee), the ball pops up and is quickly recovered by Bryant. This last part, the one about the ball popping out of his hands, was a non-event for everyone watching the game, including Terry Brown, the field judge who ruled the play a completion on the field.
The Calvin Johnson rule (named for the time the Lions wide receiver leaped up and clearly caught the game winning touchdown against the Bears, clutching and securing the ball in his equally giant hands before discarding it to the ground in disgust like a child’s toy) says that, if a receiver is going to the ground in the process of making a catch, he has to maintain possession throughout the process of the catch, even after he hits the ground. As an initial matter, everyone agrees this is a stupid rule because everyone recognizes that a catch is a catch is a catch is a catch.
With that in mind, there is indeed an interpretation of the Dez Bryant play that brings it under the purview of the stupid rule. If all you saw was Dez Bryant jumping up and landing on the ground, then the stupid rule applies and the play could be ruled an incomplete pass. Bad rule. Right call.
But that is not what I or the official on the field saw. You remember him? The “ruling on the field” guy. The guy whose real-time judgment is sacrosanct unless there is clear and irrefutable video evidence that contradicts that determination? The field judge on the sideline, who undoubtedly is aware of the Calvin Johnson rule and had a great view of the play, didn’t care that the ball popped out because he determined that Dez Bryant was no longer subject to the rule. Why? Easy. Because the ball popped out after Bryant was already doing something else – here, making a lunge for the end zone (or even switching the ball in his hands, or going down by contact, or running, or, Jesus, fucking anything works in this situation).
The officials had all the ammunition they needed to uphold the call on the field. We see it every week. Even if you would have made a different call had you first seen it in slow motion, unless there is clear and irrefutable evidence that the official on the field got it wrong, the call does not get overturned. Dez Bryant and Calvin Johnson make athletic moves with their bodies each week that the rest of us don’t really understand. Is it so unreasonable to determine that Dez Bryant is athletic enough that his second effort to advance the ball over the goal line was a different move than the one of making the catch? Not unreasonable? Then why the fuck would you overturn the call?
All Mike Pereira has done is successfully argue that there is a version of events in which the call could be called incomplete. He’s defending his friends and colleagues (and, by extension, the NFL’s reputation). But it should be obvious to us now and it should have been obvious to Steratore and the team of uncoordinated assholes in New York, that overturning the call was a boneheaded thing to do. Almost by definition, if there’s “debate in the booth” about whether it was catch, then you should uphold the ruling the field – “not enough evidence to overturn the ruling on the field.” The sports viewing public accepts that explanation every week. That’s a smart rule.
We are still talking about it and writing articles three days later because it literally ruined a classic NFL game. It has overshadowed all discussion about the Cowboys’ great season and a heroic performance by a one-legged Aaron Rodgers. I would have loved to see Aaron Rodgers with the ball with two minutes left, down by one (or three – Cowboys would have gone for the two point conversion). It erased one of the most epic, clutch, daring, superhuman plays in recent memory. If the officials upheld the ruling on the field, there may well have been a few Packers fans and Cowboys haters come out of the woodwork to complain that the ruling should have been reversed under the Calvin Johnson rule. That debate would have ended in a whimper – “are you really arguing that the refs should have made THAT call… AGAIN?!”
The troubling thing here is that the officials made a call that shows they have no genuine sense of the game being played in front of them. By undertaking the impossible task of micro-analyzing the movements of these super athletes, officials have lost the ability to use their common sense to respect and preserve the competition on the field. I know we all want to move on from this blight, but these officials do not get a free pass here. “Like the rule or hate the rule,” these officials totally fucked up.