huskerfan333157
Starter
You're bringing back memories!!!I won't say I've never seen a hold, but this d-line performance is more typical.
Statistical Evidence of Biased Officiating Against Nebraska?
- Thread starter VectorVictor
- Start date
Nebfanatic
All-American
I don't refuse to do anything. I'm simply stating, its not because our talent can't draw holds, holds just aren't being called. The Purdue game was a prime example of us getting shafted by officiating. It may not have been intentional, but they didn't call crap on Purdue despite clear holding and they got us on some ticky tack stuff. There was a phantom holding against Stan. I believe a phantom block in the back on a punt return. The roughing the passer was questionable at best. This was just the game I was at. Again, the fix may not be in, but we are on the bad end of poor officiating more often than not.
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Mierin
Assistant Coach
I think there could be bias against Nebraska. I just think this analysis shows nothing at all, nor do the anecdotes people keep posting. Also, RE: you first sentence, more talented players probably cause the holds to be a lot more obvious.
Here’s a good reply someone on resdit gave: “Some of those graphs are fairly unconvincing if you can, try doing some test so show that Nebraska is statistically different than the rest of the league. (possible i missed these) if you want help with any of this, i might get some time if you send the data over.”
Also, he didn’t look at opp. penalties vs Nebraska compared to their penalties against other teams.
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Nebfanatic
All-American
Fair enough as to the specific reddit post not proving anything. My point about the talent thing is there have been obvious holds i.e. gifford against Wisconsin and we still can't get it called. Why this is, I don't know. I error on the side of its not intentional. That said, the officiating in the Purdue game (the only game I've been to in person this season) was bad and Purdue got the benefit of that. How many other times that has happened this season is hard say and the question of how often does this happen to other teams is a fair one. I do find it interesting though we finally get a holding call the same game they bring up the fact we haven't gotten a holding call in 2 years.
Edit: i do understand also at some point if your talented enough you can make it so obvious they can't not call holding. But we shouldn't have to get to that point to have fair officiating.
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Mierin
Assistant Coach
I am definitely one of the officials screwed us over against Texas A&M people and I was pretty pissed at them in the Purdue game as well. The score looks lopsided but we were definitely in it at one point when we had a bunch of s#!tty calls go against us.
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Nebfanatic
All-American
Yea its hard not to see it that way. Another consideration I do like to make though is, these refs aren't robots. They have lives and like all of us have bad days and days their performance isn't 100%. It's tough to be a referee. Once you make a decision, the decision is made. No going back and saying you messed that one up 2 plays later. There is little room for error and if you aren't on top of your game it makes things difficult.
Born N Bled Red
All-Conference
This is some great research. Clearly shows what I've been seeing over the last few years, and trying to point out this year. One part of the analysis I feel is still missing is the timing of the calls. How many games have we watched where Nebraska is penalized heavily in the first half while the game is close, while our opponents seemingly play their cleanest half of the year. Then in the second half, when the game is all but decided suddenly the other team gets 3 or 4 penalties to "balance out" the calls. The timing of the penalties can have even more of an effect on the outcome of a game than the total number or total yards in penalties. I'd love to see these comparisons again, but in first half play or in games that continue to be close throughout.
knapplc
International Man of Mystery
For those saying we've had a terrible pass rush - this research encompasses the era with Randy Gregory, Maliek Collins, Vince Valentine, Lavonte David, Will Compton, Eric Martin, Nate Gerry, Chris Weber... that's not an untalented group, and that spans 2011 - 2016.
VectorVictor
Heisman Trophy Winner
The data sets include years in which we had significant talent on the defense. The scope is all years we've been in the B1G--not just the past two or three. Folks actually need to sit down and read the data and the post. The author covers many of the questions that people are bringing up here.
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Now, there are some aspects that warrant further attention (e.g. do teams repeatedly and outside of the mean go below their average number of penalties called per game when playing us?), but the author brings up some very valid points and data.
He actually looked at averages for all of the schools in and out of conference play. Now if they want to go into individual games (as I used as an example above), then yes, that's the next logical step for this data. But the overall program and yearly averages do show that the author's initial hypothesis warrants further investigation, as the data (so far) agrees with it.
And no, the data isn't a slam dunk lock, but it does show *something* is amiss beyond just the folks rolling eyes and blaming this on talent alone.
Very true. And I don't think anyone realistically expects officials to get it right all of the time, as they are human. This is why we have Instant Replay. But I believe it's reasonable to expect officials to put the effort forth to call a correct game and do their best to remove prejudices from their calls...and the data suggests this isn't happening.
Again, officials will never be 100% spot on with all of their calls. Not. Gonna. Happen. But it's certainly acceptable to expect them to strive towards said perfection.
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VectorVictor
Heisman Trophy Winner
That was the group that we had for the Iowa State game and one other game...and the calls were something like 33-9 or 39-9 in favor of the three teams we played against.
But hey, when the same group of officials aren't going to call an aTm player for blatantly punching one of our kids in the (Cotton) balls, and the conference failed to do anything about it, are we really shocked? I mean, it's this kind of behavior (among other things) that led to us leaving in the first place...
Mierin
Assistant Coach
I did read it. No statistical analysis was done.
It doesn’t prove anything (and wasn’t a good attempt to) but it doesn’t rule out the usefulness of looking further.
No it doesn’t show anything is amiss. “Show” is synonymous with prove.
No it doesn’t suggest they are prejudiced against Nebraska. “Show” is synonymous with prove.
Again, it isn’t even a good attempt at proving anything. He didn’t even try to calculate whether the difference is significant, let alone go into what caused the difference.
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It tries to suggest something is amiss but I'm drawing into question why this is the case, of which the author covers next to nothing. So far as I can tell, the author only vaguely references team talent at one point which, in my opinion, is a significant contributor to penalties for and against. Generally speaking, bad teams get penalized more than good teams. His narrative is pretty clear in that Nebraska is being unfairly targeted. After reading what he said, all I can say is... maybe.
Also, much of the data spikes in 2015-2016 which aligns perfectly with the decline in coaching and talent at some key positions.
So, what I said ultimately holds true - it's probably some combination of bias, Nebraska being sloppy and Nebraska not being very talented. Nebraska has been an average to below average, heavily penalized team for years. We can hope to all hope that referees approach each game equitably but... they're humans.
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Lonestar_Husker
Special Teams Player
I'm hoping someone can help me. Can there be holding on running plays? Is it just pass plays where holding occurs?
knapplc
International Man of Mystery
Yes. Holding can be called on any kind of play, including special teams plays.
