Serious ? What did Seattle do to earn wrath of Officials?

[Popeyejones]

I can't pretend to know if the refs hate Seattle or it's just, as some say, a result of their own perceptions.

I think a big part of what leads the perception is that the Seahawks get penalized a ton for all the reasons outlined above, which don't have anything to do with refs.

Even in his Field Gulls post the author acknowledges that a huge part of the turnover disparity for the Hawks is that they get called for offensive false starts way more than anyone else. That's not because of biased officiating, it because they have a bad offensive line on what is overall a very undisciplined team both on and off the field, which comes from the top-down as everyone already knows.

But I do know our head coach has indicated this is a problem.

So what? Kyle Shannahan has made the same claim about the 9ers this year. Chip Kelly did too last year. Harbaugh did all the time also, and Tomsula would have done it too if he had been able to string an eight word sentence together.

Every coach complains about officiating hurting his team.

Our own players notice.

And players from every team every year complain in the media about officiating hurting them. So what?

Then on top of that, we have data and charts that show their was a really bad bias for chunks in a season(they probably let up when attention is brought to them).

And data and charts that show the opposite, which you're ignoring, and all the rules of random variation in small sample sizes which you're pretending don't exist so as to hold onto a claim of "really bad bias."

To be clear, I'm more than happy to acknowledge the possibility that there's an NFL-level conspiracy against the Seahawks, it's just that it's a really far-fetched claim, and all the evidence for it doesn't hold up to much of any scrutiny.

Then when I watch games now I look to see if the calls at least go both ways. Sometimes they do but most of the time Seattle is forced to play much cleaner.

This is a great example of cognitive bias. The name of the cognitive bias you're talking about is "confirmation bias." You have a belief, so you set out to examine if your belief is true, and lo and behold, overall you find confirmation in your belief. That doesn't make you bad or abnormal, it makes you just like everyone else, myself included.

 

[MD5eahawks]

I have never believed that the refs miss calls intentionally or sway their decisions to benefit any particular team. It may certainly look that way but I just can't see it happening. Too much money at stake. Do they miss calls? Absolutely! I've never believed XL was a conspiracy or a "Bettis Bowl" as I've seen here. It doesn't make sense. The league would've benefited by a much wider margin allowing the Hawks to win that game. The Steelers didn't need any boost. And I'm sure the league could care less if Bettis won going out. If you stop and think about it and be honest with yourself, it just doesn't make sense. The refs just had a terrible game and it affected the outcome.

Most fans feel as if the refs are out to get them. All you have to do is check the other team fan forums. Reading through the Falcons thread below is funny. They complain about the no-called holds by the Seahawks. And most of them are shocked that the tripping foul was called.
https://boards.atlantafalcons.com/topic/4058855-i-know-it’s-so-cliche-but-the-refs/

One problem that has made things worse is the constant questioning of the officials from the broadcasters while they're commentating the game live. It definitely has an influence on the fans watching. Watch tomorrow's game and you will see what I'm talking about. And Collinsworth has a really bad habit of doing it.

 

[chris98251]

I have never believed that the refs miss calls intentionally or sway their decisions to benefit any particular team. It may certainly look that way but I just can't see it happening. Too much money at stake. Do they miss calls? Absolutely! I've never believed XL was a conspiracy or a "Bettis Bowl" as I've seen here. It doesn't make sense. The league would've benefited by a much wider margin allowing the Hawks to win that game. The Steelers didn't need any boost. And I'm sure the league could care less if Bettis won going out. If you stop and think about it and be honest with yourself, it just doesn't make sense. The refs just had a terrible game and it affected the outcome.

Most fans feel as if the refs are out to get them. All you have to do is check the other team fan forums. Reading through the Falcons thread below is funny. They complain about the no-called holds by the Seahawks. And most of them are shocked that the tripping foul was called.
https://boards.atlantafalcons.com/topic/4058855-i-know-it’s-so-cliche-but-the-refs/

One problem that has made things worse is the constant questioning of the officials from the broadcasters while they're commentating the game live. It definitely has an influence on the fans watching. Watch tomorrow's game and you will see what I'm talking about. And Collinsworth has a really bad habit of doing it.

To properly answer this would get me banned for a lifetime.

 

[Northwest Seahawk]

I think some of you are on autorespond and you arent reading the complaints.

Yes, the hawks have a rep. Yes that probably causes a closer eye at times.

But that should have NOTHING to do with how equitable a game is called.

Holding is holding. Pi is Pi.

And yet game after game after game, that is not how it plays out. Double standards abound.

Its not ok under any circumstances, and the excuse making hawk fans are making for the inequality is quite frankly terrible.

Dont tell me the hawks need to be "more disciplined" in order to have a game called fairly. That's BS.

I agree 100 percent this goes way beyond margin of error or any other metric you can dream up . There profiling the Seahawks plain and simple and it's time for the FO and fans to start pointing this out . The amount of penalty's being called can only be explained by the refs/league are biased against the Seahawks that's a fact . Then there's the game in game out eye test that's on film that proves there's bias or you have to believe that every game Seattle plays in the refs suddenly forget what the rules are.

 

[cymatica]

I think some of you are on autorespond and you arent reading the complaints.

Yes, the hawks have a rep. Yes that probably causes a closer eye at times.

But that should have NOTHING to do with how equitable a game is called.

Holding is holding. Pi is Pi.

And yet game after game after game, that is not how it plays out. Double standards abound.

Its not ok under any circumstances, and the excuse making hawk fans are making for the inequality is quite frankly terrible.

Dont tell me the hawks need to be "more disciplined" in order to have a game called fairly. That's BS.

I agree 100 percent this goes way beyond margin of error or any other metric you can dream up . There profiling the Seahawks plain and simple and it's time for the FO and fans to start pointing this out . The amount of penalty's being called can only be explained by the refs/league are biased against the Seahawks that's a fact . Then there's the game in game out eye test that's on film that proves there's bias or you have to believe that every game Seattle plays in the refs suddenly forget what the rules are.

You mean like Kearse getting flagged on every pick play the same season the Saints run two on us the same game with no flag?

 

[cymatica]

I can't pretend to know if the refs hate Seattle or it's just, as some say, a result of their own perceptions.

I think a big part of what leads the perception is that the Seahawks get penalized a ton for all the reasons outlined above, which don't have anything to do with refs.

Even in his Field Gulls post the author acknowledges that a huge part of the turnover disparity for the Hawks is that they get called for offensive false starts way more than anyone else. That's not because of biased officiating, it because they have a bad offensive line on what is overall a very undisciplined team both on and off the field, which comes from the top-down as everyone already knows.

But I do know our head coach has indicated this is a problem.

So what? Kyle Shannahan has made the same claim about the 9ers this year. Chip Kelly did too last year. Harbaugh did all the time also, and Tomsula would have done it too if he had been able to string an eight word sentence together.

Every coach complains about officiating hurting his team.

Our own players notice.

And players from every team every year complain in the media about officiating hurting them. So what?

Then on top of that, we have data and charts that show their was a really bad bias for chunks in a season(they probably let up when attention is brought to them).

And data and charts that show the opposite, which you're ignoring, and all the rules of random variation in small sample sizes which you're pretending don't exist so as to hold onto a claim of "really bad bias."

To be clear, I'm more than happy to acknowledge the possibility that there's an NFL-level conspiracy against the Seahawks, it's just that it's a really far-fetched claim, and all the evidence for it doesn't hold up to much of any scrutiny.

Then when I watch games now I look to see if the calls at least go both ways. Sometimes they do but most of the time Seattle is forced to play much cleaner.

This is a great example of cognitive bias. The name of the cognitive bias you're talking about is "confirmation bias." You have a belief, so you set out to examine if your belief is true, and lo and behold, overall you find confirmation in your belief. That doesn't make you bad or abnormal, it makes you just like everyone else, myself included.

Your own cognitive bias of how a sports fan reacts to a game also skews your own perception in all this. I also think your emotional investment in the nfl(understandable, its ingrained in our culture) causes denial to set in when faced with the reality games can be steered in certain directions.

If things in life that have much greater impact on our society are susceptible to foul play, then why not an entertainment business worth billions?

In order for me not to believe something stinks, then I have to believe NFL referee's, for the most part, are incabable of doing their job at even just a satisfactory level. Is NFL management really that incompetent to not see their product being ruined?

 

[Popeyejones]

Your own cognitive bias of how a sports fan reacts to a game also skews your own perception in all this. I also think your emotional investment in the nfl(understandable, its ingrained in our culture) causes denial to set in when faced with the reality games can be steered in certain directions.

If things in life that have much greater impact on our society are susceptible to foul play, then why not an entertainment business worth billions?

In order for me not to believe something stinks, then I have to believe NFL referee's, for the most part, are incabable of doing their job at even just a satisfactory level. Is NFL management really that incompetent to not see their product being ruined?

You're absolutely correct that I enter this conversation with the prior that there's not an NFL-wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down. I'd say the same thing if you were a Pats fan (some of them believe that the NFL-wide conspiracy is to keep them down and y'all are just crazy), a Steelers fan (same), an Eagles fan (same),a 49ers fan (same), a Chargers fan (same), an Astros fan (same), a Bucks fan (same), and so on for some fans of every team across every sport.

I'll answer your question as to why I enter the conversation with the prior that there's not a league wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down (sincerely), but first, I really am curious:

Hawks fans and Falcons fans literally watched the exact same game. If fans' interpretations of reality aren't colored by their rooting interests how can you explain this:

https://boards.atlantafalcons.com/topic ... -the-refs/

They're saying things like "Always gotta play 2 teams when you play in Seattle. Seahawks and the refs" and "The refs were honestly not that bad by Seattle standards...luckily we escaped the Ref's Nest in one piece."

Should I be listening to Hawks fans who insist there's an NFL-level conspiracy to keep the Hawks down, or Falcons fans who insist there's a NFL-level conspiracy to prop the Hawks up?

Should I be listening to Hawks fans who are upset about all the bad holding calls and non-calls that unfairly kept the Seahawks down, or Falcons fans who are upset about all the bad holding calls and non-calls that kept the Falcons down?

Seriously, explain it to me.

 

[cymatica]

Your own cognitive bias of how a sports fan reacts to a game also skews your own perception in all this. I also think your emotional investment in the nfl(understandable, its ingrained in our culture) causes denial to set in when faced with the reality games can be steered in certain directions.

If things in life that have much greater impact on our society are susceptible to foul play, then why not an entertainment business worth billions?

In order for me not to believe something stinks, then I have to believe NFL referee's, for the most part, are incabable of doing their job at even just a satisfactory level. Is NFL management really that incompetent to not see their product being ruined?

You're absolutely correct that I enter this conversation with the prior that there's not an NFL-wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down. I'd say the same thing if you were a Pats fan (some of them believe that the NFL-wide conspiracy is to keep them down and y'all are just crazy), a Steelers fan (same), an Eagles fan (same),a 49ers fan (same), a Chargers fan (same), an Astros fan (same), a Bucks fan (same), and so on for some fans of every team across every sport.

I'll answer your question as to why I enter the conversation with the prior that there's not a league wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down (sincerely), but first, I really am curious:

Hawks fans and Falcons fans literally watched the exact same game. If fans' interpretations of reality aren't colored by their rooting interests how can you explain this:

https://boards.atlantafalcons.com/topic ... -the-refs/

They're saying things like "Always gotta play 2 teams when you play in Seattle. Seahawks and the refs" and "The refs were honestly not that bad by Seattle standards...luckily we escaped the Ref's Nest in one piece."

Should I be listening to Hawks fans who insist there's an NFL-level conspiracy to keep the Hawks down, or Falcons fans who insist there's a NFL-level conspiracy to prop the Hawks up?

Should I be listening to Hawks fans who are upset about all the bad holding calls and non-calls that unfairly kept the Seahawks down, or Falcons fans who are upset about all the bad holding calls and non-calls that kept the Falcons down?

Seriously, explain it to me.

You are assuming the game can be fixed just to keep my favorite team down, when it has nothing to do with that. Could be to keep the games close for ratings. Could be money involved at high or low levels(maybe1 or 2 refs in a crew are compromised without others knowledge) . There could be data that indicates wins or losses in certain areas at certain times produce certain results marketing wise. Hell maybe they have data that tells which teams most fans want to see succeed.

There are a number of reasons why they may do this. You seem convinced the league is not out to get my favorite team and i agree, that would be a stupid reason. I would think it has more to do with ratings and money.

Either i lean towards corruption or incompetence. The incompetence has gotton so bad it's beyond what I would call human error, especially when the humans that error frequently are supposed to be the best of the best

 

[Popeyejones]

Okay, so we agree that there is not strategic bias against the Seahawks then.

Still happy to deal with all that other stuff, but you still haven't answered my question.

 

[cymatica]

Okay, so we agree that there is not strategic bias against the Seahawks then.

Still happy to deal with all that other stuff, but you still haven't answered my question.

Your questions involve fan reactions on message boards. If your argument is to tell me refs can't steer games because both teams fans perceive bias, then I don't see how that changes anything. Yes you can go on every message board and find posts for every team being unfairly officiated. That does prove a general bias, it does not disprove corruption.

 

[Popeyejones]

Okay, so we agree that there is not strategic bias against the Seahawks then.

Still happy to deal with all that other stuff, but you still haven't answered my question.

Your questions involve fan reactions on message boards. If your argument is to tell me refs can't steer games because both teams fans perceive bias, then I don't see how that changes anything. Yes you can go on every message board and find posts for every team being unfairly officiated. That does prove a general bias, it does not disprove corruption.

1. You're still not answering my question. Please do so.

2. You're dramatically shifted the goalposts. On the last page you were claiming that officials were calling games so unfairly against the Hawks that other teams are strategically committing more penalties against them. Now you're saying that's not true and there's just general corruption to steer games into being close.

3. The implication of this is actually in direct contradiction to your claim of the previous page. If the conspiracy is to keep games close, the Hawks and Wilson are well known for their impressive number of 4th quarter comebacks. They come back against teams in the 4th quarter at MUCH higher rates than teams come back and win against them in the 4th quarter.

As a result of that, if you want to stick with this game-steering conspiracy, basically what you're telling me is that you think the Seahawks are most often the beneficiaries of biased officiating.

If that's the hill you want to die on, be my guest, but I don't buy that one either.

 

[cymatica]

Okay, so we agree that there is not strategic bias against the Seahawks then.

Still happy to deal with all that other stuff, but you still haven't answered my question.

Your questions involve fan reactions on message boards. If your argument is to tell me refs can't steer games because both teams fans perceive bias, then I don't see how that changes anything. Yes you can go on every message board and find posts for every team being unfairly officiated. That does prove a general bias, it does not disprove corruption.

1. You're still not answering my question. Please do so.

2. You're dramatically shifted the goalposts. On the last page you were claiming that officials were calling games so unfairly against the Hawks that other teams are strategically committing more penalties against them. Now you're saying that's not true and there's just general corruption to steer games into being close.

3. The implication of this is actually in direct contradiction to your claim of the previous page. If the conspiracy is to keep games close, the Hawks and Wilson are well known for their impressive number of 4th quarter comebacks. They come back against teams in the 4th quarter at MUCH higher rates than teams come back and win against them in the 4th quarter.

As a result of that, if you want to stick with this game-steering conspiracy, basically what you're telling me is that you think the Seahawks are most often the beneficiaries of biased officiating.

If that's the hill you want to die on, be my guest, but I don't buy that one either.

1. I did answer your question. Using a general consensus of fan reactions on message boards doesn't prove or disprove foul play.

2. I claimed that if the tape showed our dline getting mugged all the time, naturally a player would play on edge more. Did i state ot as a fact? No. If our team has a reputation, and the officials swallow whistles on holds against our dline, is it unreasonable to assume other players might pick up on it?

3. I could argue the games wouldn't be as close in the first place without ticky tac drive extending penalties(AZ game).

Part of me says you don't need to fix the games, it's all just bread and circus. But I do know that corruptions follows money and power, which the NFL has a lot of.

 

[chris98251]

Lets put it this way, it happened in the NBA, it happened in the MLB, and it happened in Soccer.

 

[Popeyejones]

^^^To the best of my knowledge the accusation of this thread has happened in none of those sports.

We’re not talking about a ref influencing random games he’s assigned to personally profit. We’re not talking about corruption in securing Super Bowl bids.

We’re talking a system wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down, or at least we were, until someone read a Florio think piece and started pretending that what they really mean was a system wide conspiracy to keep games close.

 

[Popeyejones]

Okay, so we agree that there is not strategic bias against the Seahawks then.

Still happy to deal with all that other stuff, but you still haven't answered my question.

Your questions involve fan reactions on message boards. If your argument is to tell me refs can't steer games because both teams fans perceive bias, then I don't see how that changes anything. Yes you can go on every message board and find posts for every team being unfairly officiated. That does prove a general bias, it does not disprove corruption.

1. You're still not answering my question. Please do so.

2. You're dramatically shifted the goalposts. On the last page you were claiming that officials were calling games so unfairly against the Hawks that other teams are strategically committing more penalties against them. Now you're saying that's not true and there's just general corruption to steer games into being close.

3. The implication of this is actually in direct contradiction to your claim of the previous page. If the conspiracy is to keep games close, the Hawks and Wilson are well known for their impressive number of 4th quarter comebacks. They come back against teams in the 4th quarter at MUCH higher rates than teams come back and win against them in the 4th quarter.

As a result of that, if you want to stick with this game-steering conspiracy, basically what you're telling me is that you think the Seahawks are most often the beneficiaries of biased officiating.

If that's the hill you want to die on, be my guest, but I don't buy that one either.

1. I did answer your question. Using a general consensus of fan reactions on message boards doesn't prove or disprove foul play.

2. I claimed that if the tape showed our dline getting mugged all the time, naturally a player would play on edge more. Did i state ot as a fact? No. If our team has a reputation, and the officials swallow whistles on holds against our dline, is it unreasonable to assume other players might pick up on it?

3. I could argue the games wouldn't be as close in the first place without ticky tac drive extending penalties(AZ game).

Part of me says you don't need to fix the games, it's all just bread and circus. But I do know that corruptions follows money and power, which the NFL has a lot of.

1. I’m asking you to explain how it happens, not to comment on it in relation to your theory.

2. And this is why. You saw a game in which your favorite teams d line was getting unfairly mugged all game. Fans of the opponent team saw the exact opposite. Why are you right and they’re wrong? Why are you trustworthy and they’re not? My point is that when it comes to officiating, fans talking about their own teams are the least trustworthy people on earth.

3. Nah, 4th quarter comebacks are the best way to create excitement. You believe that the NFL is cheating in the Seahawks favor. You believe Wilson’s 4th quarter comebacks are actually bogus. Sorry dude. I obviously disagree, but there’s no weaseling out of that.

 

[cymatica]

Your questions involve fan reactions on message boards. If your argument is to tell me refs can't steer games because both teams fans perceive bias, then I don't see how that changes anything. Yes you can go on every message board and find posts for every team being unfairly officiated. That does prove a general bias, it does not disprove corruption.

1. You're still not answering my question. Please do so.

2. You're dramatically shifted the goalposts. On the last page you were claiming that officials were calling games so unfairly against the Hawks that other teams are strategically committing more penalties against them. Now you're saying that's not true and there's just general corruption to steer games into being close.

3. The implication of this is actually in direct contradiction to your claim of the previous page. If the conspiracy is to keep games close, the Hawks and Wilson are well known for their impressive number of 4th quarter comebacks. They come back against teams in the 4th quarter at MUCH higher rates than teams come back and win against them in the 4th quarter.

As a result of that, if you want to stick with this game-steering conspiracy, basically what you're telling me is that you think the Seahawks are most often the beneficiaries of biased officiating.

If that's the hill you want to die on, be my guest, but I don't buy that one either.

1. I did answer your question. Using a general consensus of fan reactions on message boards doesn't prove or disprove foul play.

2. I claimed that if the tape showed our dline getting mugged all the time, naturally a player would play on edge more. Did i state ot as a fact? No. If our team has a reputation, and the officials swallow whistles on holds against our dline, is it unreasonable to assume other players might pick up on it?

3. I could argue the games wouldn't be as close in the first place without ticky tac drive extending penalties(AZ game).

Part of me says you don't need to fix the games, it's all just bread and circus. But I do know that corruptions follows money and power, which the NFL has a lot of.

1. I’m asking you to explain how it happens, not to comment on it in relation to your theory.

2. And this is why. You saw a game in which your favorite teams d line was getting unfairly mugged all game. Fans of the opponent team saw the exact opposite. Why are you right and they’re wrong? Why are you trustworthy and they’re not? My point is that when it comes to officiating, fans talking about their own teams are the least trustworthy people on earth.

3. Nah, 4th quarter comebacks are the best way to create excitement. You believe that the NFL is cheating in the Seahawks favor. You believe Wilson’s 4th quarter comebacks are actually bogus. Sorry dude. I obviously disagree, but there’s no weaseling out of that.

Nice strawman on point 3, nothing you said was accurate. You are either just arguing for the sake of arguing, or missing what I am saying entirely. You are also assuming I can't possibly be right because most fans are untrustrworthy in this matter. Well it's not just Seahawk games. If I didn't notice officials getting way too involved in every game I watch then I might agree.

you saw a game in which your dline was getting unfairly mugged

There you go assuming again. It's been going on more than one season. There's a reason Benett has no shoulder pads. The whole point was never about just the dline getting mugged it was all about consistency for both teams. You can come up with fan reaction statistics or any other reason why game steering cant possibly exist, but even with that enlightenment I've received, my eyes still don't lie.

The question you want me to answer is a trick question. It's based on your preconceived notion that there is no corruption and everything I conclude is a result of my own bias. You only give me two answers to your bait question. Here's your answer though: don't listen to either fanbase. Watch for yourself and make your own assessment.

 

[chris98251]

^^^To the best of my knowledge the accusation of this thread has happened in none of those sports.

We’re not talking about a ref influencing random games he’s assigned to personally profit. We’re not talking about corruption in securing Super Bowl bids.

We’re talking a system wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down, or at least we were, until someone read a Florio think piece and started pretending that what they really mean was a system wide conspiracy to keep games close.

They busted an official a few years ago for guiding games in the NBA.

The 2007 NBA betting scandal was a scandal involving the National Basketball Association (NBA) and accusations that an NBA referee used his knowledge of relationships between referees, coaches, players and owners to bet on professional basketball games. In July 2007, reports of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) were made public, which alleged that during the 2005–06 and 2006–07 NBA seasons, referee Tim Donaghy bet on games in which he officiated.[1]
On August 15, 2007, Donaghy pleaded guilty to two federal charges related to the investigation, and a year later he was sentenced to 15 months in prison and three years of supervised release. As a result, the general reaction by the media was that the NBA's popularity would be hurt by the news of this scandal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_NBA_betting_scandal

The Black Sox Scandal was a Major League Baseball match fixing incident in which eight members of the Chicago White Sox were accused of intentionally losing the 1919 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds in exchange for money from a gambling syndicate led by Arnold Rothstein. The fallout from the scandal resulted in the appointment of Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis as the first Commissioner of Baseball, granting him absolute control over the sport in order to restore its integrity.
Despite acquittals in a public trial in 1921, Judge Landis permanently banned all eight men from professional baseball. The punishment was eventually defined to also include banishment from post-career honors such as consideration for the Baseball Hall of Fame. Despite requests for reinstatement in the decades that followed (particularly in the case of Shoeless Joe Jackson), the ban remains in force as of 2017.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sox_Scandal

The report found that the match-rigging syndicate and its referees infiltrated the upper reaches of global soccer in order to fix exhibition matches and exploit them for betting purposes. It provides extensive details of the clever and brazen ways that fixers apparently manipulated “at least five matches and possibly more” in South Africa ahead of the last World Cup. As many as 15 matches were targets, including a game between the United States and Australia, according to interviews and emails printed in the FIFA report.

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/sports/soccer/fixed-matches-cast-shadow-over-world-cup.html

Go ahead and call bullshit on these, then tell me the Steeler Super Bowl wasn't suspiciously called, and that the amount of flags common in todays games are not possibly steering games.

 

[cymatica]

We’re talking a system wide conspiracy to keep your favorite team down, or at least we were, until someone read a Florio think piece and started pretending that what they really mean was a system wide conspiracy to keep games close.

It was always about other reasons than keeping your favorite team down. It might not even be a system wide conspiracy. For all we know it's just sporatic rogue officials doing it for some nefarious reason and the NFL is trying to fix the problem while protecting their image(why admit you've had any problems, fan would question every bad call moreso). Hell, maybe it's some inside joke among officials to screw with certain teams, and no one would ever be able to prove it.

 

[jammerhawk]

You lose the 'benefit of the doubt' when you get a reputation for things.

Consequently, we won't get 50/50 calls.

Human nature.

Still reputational bias aside, officials are not calling penalties evenly against the team.

That makes it even harder to win when the other team always gets "the benefit of the doubt".

A reasonable analysis of the statistical likelihood of every team we face having less and often significantly less than their normal number of penalties when they play Seattle speaks to how pervasive the bias is against Seattle. If this is so it can only be perceived as an intentional bias. That is born out game after game.

Kvetching about refereeing is justified. The sheer number of penalties is starting to interfere with the game and the referees are becoming the show and determining outcomes.

 

[HAWKAMANIA]

The officiating hasn’t been great but for as many penalties they’ve called it could easily be double with Ifedi moving early at least once every drive.

And it’s not so much the amount of penalties but the timing of them that’s been hurting the team, some calls are justifiable, some are not.

Compared with most teams in recent years, the hawks have been treated favorably by the officials.

One thing that does bother me are the PI calls that are missed when other teams run a pick n pass but when the Seahawks try one it’s always called.