Official Ruling on Osborne hit/Gabbert fumble

[dutch91701]

WOW- i don't like giving legs to the conspiracy theory either

 

Hate it or not, most look like this

[Doctor Tom]

[JTrain]

If that's an illegal hit, how do you tackle? He had his head all the way up, arms open to wrap up and drove through with the legs. Gabbert saw him on the last second. Of course the facemasks will collide, Gabbert is standing straight up.

 

Honestly, how does a blitzing player tackle a stick straight quarterback? Put the head down and spear into the gut? That's a good way to break your neck. Dive at the ankles? Terrible technique not to mention chance of snapping a QBs leg. Push him with arms extended hockey check style? Horribly unreliable way of bringing down a 230 pound tower. I guess that leaves the limbo-imitation style.

 

This is getting ridiculous. The Martin hit was close call, but Cunningham sounded like an idiot with the Osborne hit. Shut up. Also, Franklin has been suspiciously silent during these Cunningham rants. I wonder if he's thinking, "Son, I'm old enough to have watched Dick Butkus. If you think that was bad, maybe you should try basketball."

[Hercules]

Wow, this thread went in about 14 different directions since I started it last night.

 

I'm not going to get into the helmet-to-helmet thing too much. It seems to me from watching this game, and watching others yesterday (UT-Baylor, Oregon-USC), no one really understands when the helmet-to-helmet penalty should be called. About 1/10 of these hits seem to be malicious hits by the defender, trying to hurt the other player. The other 9 seem to basically be collisions that are inevitable in this game.

 

I think both Osborne's hit and Meredith's hit were simply collisions, similar to when Osborne knocked Alfonzo Dennard (teammates) out of the game with a helmet-to-helmet hit. On Osborne, when Gabbert saw Osborne coming, Gabbert's stance changed and he became closer to the ground. Courtney Osborne is running at full speed, aimed at Gabbert's left shoulder, and then Gabbert takes a little step and all of a sudden it's a helmet-to-helmet hit. How does Osborne adjust that? How can you ask any defender to play aggressively without those plays happening by accident every now and then?

 

Meredith's hit earlier in the game was similar. He was coming off a blocker, while Gabbert stepped up in the pocket, and the two collided. Meredith had no chance to adjust his stance to aim for any other part of Gabbert's body, the game is simply much too fast for that.

 

However, the spectacular thing about this play has NOTHING to do with helmet-to-helmet hits. There was no penalty flag thrown for that, so it's out of the question. The play CLEARLY resulted in a fumble, though on the field the play was ruled dead. However, the immediate action after the play showed clearly that Nebraska had recovered an apparent fumble. The officials than reviewed the call to see if a fumble had taken place, which IS a reviewable ruling. The officials then, instead of concluding that there was a fumble and it had been recovered by Nebraska, concluded that the play was dead before Gabbert's fumble because of his forward progress.

 

Gabbert got hit, and he dropped the ball immediately. Any amateur football fan can see that forward progress had nothing to do with this play.

I believe this has to be one of the worst calls I've ever seen in college football. It's one thing to miss a Penn State receiver catching a pass 3 feet out of bounds in 1982 (without replay review). It's one thing to miss a clear fumble (without replay review). It's one thing to miss an obvious facemask on Eric Crouch in 1999 in Manhattan (without replay review).

 

Here, the officials missed the fumble, then watched the replay, saw that they were wrong, and BLATANTLY made up a bunch of crap in order to give the ball to Missouri.

 

 

As said in the OP, I'm now fully on the conspiracy bandwagon.

[TripleOption]

I don't know about conspiracy, but I do have to say that the forward progress call was among the dumbest I've ever heard. Forward progress? On a collision that took Gabbert down almost instantaneously? That is some ridiculously stupid crap. I did have a strong feeling that they just made that up in order to punish Nebraska for the supposedly cheap hit that wasn't reviewable.

[JTrain]

I rewatched the hit by Osborne. He sacked the QB and the helmets did hit. It was a fumble, no question. If a flag would've been thrown for helmet to helmet, so be it. They stopped the clock and let Gabbert go to the sideline. They broke for commercial and did some kind of review. After the commercial break they came back and said 3rd and 22 with no explanation. They started the clock again and that is when Gabbert ran for 10 yards and they punted. The way that played developed, how is there anyway that could not be ruled a fumble? Just blows my mind.

 

That's the part that bothers me. I don't know the last time I saw a review end with no explanation from the ref as to what was being challenged or what the final decision was, and yet it happened twice in this game.

[Sparker]

I don't know about conspiracy, but I do have to say that the forward progress call was among the dumbest I've ever heard. Forward progress? On a collision that took Gabbert down almost instantaneously? That is some ridiculously stupid crap. I did have a strong feeling that they just made that up in order to punish Nebraska for the supposedly cheap hit that wasn't reviewable.

 

Same thing happened with a different fumble. There was a facemask that wasn't called (I think it was Crick) and the play resulted in a fumble recovered by us. The instant I saw the facemask I knew they weren't going to give us the ball. The facemask isn't reviewable, but the fumble is. They see the facemask and decide to ignore the fumble. I can see why they ignored that one, though.

 

If we were on the receiving end of that play and lost a ball due to facemask but the penalty was missed and then on top of it have the ball taken away due to video review.... What a mess. They are ignoring the written rules and going by how they feel the play should have ended.

[HuskerGBR]

I don't think there is a conspiracy against us. I just think the Big XII refs are the worst out there. They have been a problem for a long time now...not just this year. But they missed a PI against us (not in the endzone though). Then they missed the fumble Osborne caused for us. The officiating was bad this game, but I have to admit I have seen worse.

 

The only conspiracy there is though...is when you play Texas. It doesn't matter who they play...they will get every call imaginable.

[epocSoN]

Here are my thoughts. And they are correct, and shouldn't be disputed by anyone.

 

The refs, and replay officials blew many calls yesterday.

 

For Missouri -

 

They missed a few PI calls on us, they would have been close, but I think they had enough evidence to throw a couple more flags on us.

They missed a blatant face mask call on Cameron Meridith when Gabbert scrambled to the goal line. The fumble was too close to call and it wouldn't of mattered anyway if they would have gotten the face mask call correctly.

 

For Nebraska -

They missed the fumble after Osborn laid the smack down on Gabbert. The hit was legal, and he fumbled which was returned for a TD.

They missed many holding and block in the back calls on the Missouri O line.

They missed a false start by the missouri left guard, instead thy called offsides on Merridith.

 

Either way you look at it, the refs were absolutely terrible for both sides.

[dutch91701]

If that's an illegal hit, how do you tackle? He had his head all the way up, arms open to wrap up and drove through with the legs. Gabbert saw him on the last second. Of course the facemasks will collide, Gabbert is standing straight up.

 

Honestly, how does a blitzing player tackle a stick straight quarterback? Put the head down and spear into the gut? That's a good way to break your neck. Dive at the ankles? Terrible technique not to mention chance of snapping a QBs leg. Push him with arms extended hockey check style? Horribly unreliable way of bringing down a 230 pound tower. I guess that leaves the limbo-imitation style.

 

This is getting ridiculous. The Martin hit was close call, but Cunningham sounded like an idiot with the Osborne hit. Shut up. Also, Franklin has been suspiciously silent during these Cunningham rants. I wonder if he's thinking, "Son, I'm old enough to have watched Dick Butkus. If you think that was bad, maybe you should try basketball."

 

Franklin was the one who wanted Asante put to death last year for hits that also were clean.

[DaveH]

There were bad calls both ways. I can think of a serious face mask on Gabbert and at least a couple of PI calls that were missed. There is no conspiracy, missed calls are part of the game.

There's a difference between missed facemasks and looking at a play for 5 minutes and still getting it wrong.

[DaveH]

Oh, and this bullcrap about hitting and helmets needs to stop. Why don't we just have the players put on flags and be done with it?

[JTrain]

Wow, this thread went in about 14 different directions since I started it last night.

 

I'm not going to get into the helmet-to-helmet thing too much. It seems to me from watching this game, and watching others yesterday (UT-Baylor, Oregon-USC), no one really understands when the helmet-to-helmet penalty should be called. About 1/10 of these hits seem to be malicious hits by the defender, trying to hurt the other player. The other 9 seem to basically be collisions that are inevitable in this game.

 

I think both Osborne's hit and Meredith's hit were simply collisions, similar to when Osborne knocked Alfonzo Dennard (teammates) out of the game with a helmet-to-helmet hit. On Osborne, when Gabbert saw Osborne coming, Gabbert's stance changed and he became closer to the ground. Courtney Osborne is running at full speed, aimed at Gabbert's left shoulder, and then Gabbert takes a little step and all of a sudden it's a helmet-to-helmet hit. How does Osborne adjust that? How can you ask any defender to play aggressively without those plays happening by accident every now and then?

 

Meredith's hit earlier in the game was similar. He was coming off a blocker, while Gabbert stepped up in the pocket, and the two collided. Meredith had no chance to adjust his stance to aim for any other part of Gabbert's body, the game is simply much too fast for that.

 

However, the spectacular thing about this play has NOTHING to do with helmet-to-helmet hits. There was no penalty flag thrown for that, so it's out of the question. The play CLEARLY resulted in a fumble, though on the field the play was ruled dead. However, the immediate action after the play showed clearly that Nebraska had recovered an apparent fumble. The officials than reviewed the call to see if a fumble had taken place, which IS a reviewable ruling. The officials then, instead of concluding that there was a fumble and it had been recovered by Nebraska, concluded that the play was dead before Gabbert's fumble because of his forward progress.

 

Gabbert got hit, and he dropped the ball immediately. Any amateur football fan can see that forward progress had nothing to do with this play.

I believe this has to be one of the worst calls I've ever seen in college football. It's one thing to miss a Penn State receiver catching a pass 3 feet out of bounds in 1982 (without replay review). It's one thing to miss a clear fumble (without replay review). It's one thing to miss an obvious facemask on Eric Crouch in 1999 in Manhattan (without replay review).

 

Here, the officials missed the fumble, then watched the replay, saw that they were wrong, and BLATANTLY made up a bunch of crap in order to give the ball to Missouri.

 

 

As said in the OP, I'm now fully on the conspiracy bandwagon.

 

I dunno... TripleOption's theory seems more viable than any conspiracy. They called it a non-fumble as a sort of "make-up call" in response to not flagging any helmet to helmet contact. Regardless, I wish they released audio recordings or transcripts of the replay officials discussing what he sees to the on-the-field ref. For accountability they probably should.

 

Replay Official: Yeah, the ball's definitely out before his butt hits. You probably should've flagged Nebraska for the helmet contact though. I can hear Cunningham three booths over having another conniption fit. The office is going to be on our asses again.

 

Field Official: Well, sh#t. What do we do? Should we just say the play stands and at least give Missouri the ball?

 

RO: And, how do we explain that?

 

FO: How the hell should I know? You're the one with the rulebook...

 

RO: Hmm. I dunno, just don't say anything. If anybody asks we'll just bullsh#t out of it. God knows this rulebook has enough useless crap, I'm sure we'll come up with something.

[Hercules]

There were bad calls both ways. I can think of a serious face mask on Gabbert and at least a couple of PI calls that were missed. There is no conspiracy, missed calls are part of the game.

There's a difference between missed facemasks and looking at a play for 5 minutes and still getting it wrong.

 

There's also a difference between "getting it wrong" and getting it so spectacularly wrong that the only logical explanation is that they deliberately made the wrong call.

 

The Big 12 refs are bad. But they are not that bad.

[JTrain]

I hope somebody at Nebraska demands an explanation from the head of officiating. I doubt they will get one that makes much sense though.