Officiating: IU Holding/False Starts/Targeting

Submitted by Bigku22 on

I don't blame officiating for any result, and don't want to be that guy.I believe bad officiating is something both sides have to deal with. However since we won I feel this can be more objective. There are thee points I wanted to discuss and gauge reaction. 

1) IU Offensive line holding. Indiana got called for holding one time in this game. (in the first half) I know their O line is very good and we got mauled up front. But in the 4Q and OT literally every Howard run to the outside, I watched the line, multiple cases where they were just grabbing our defenders, tackling, no calls. They set the edge on every outside run by grabbing our edge defender and not letting him outside. I saw coaches screaming for holding, and the broadcast mentioned it once. I guess we didn't get called for it either, officials just letting them play. Maybe im biased, have to review the game again, but I thought it was pretty blatant. 

2) I've seen this mentioned on the board last night and today, IU O-line looked to be starting early almost every snap. They got called for multiple false starts, but literally almost every play they had some type of movement. In both cases the holding and false starts, I guess if you can get away with it, than why not. 

3) The ejection rule for targeting needs to be eliminated immediatley, if not the entire rule itself. It's the most subjective, poorly called rule in football I've ever seen. The difference of impact between the Bolden targeting ejection vs MSU, and the hit Rudock took yesterday is expontential. If they want it to be a personal foul penalty I guess that's fine, but the impact of ejecting a player on a call that is accurate MAYBE half the time is absurd. 

MGoBoard
Football
penalty

Danwillhor

November 15th, 2015 at 3:16 PM ^

with modern football on every level. I'm glad another noticed the basic stop of natural flow by defenders. Like you said, the initial block is often ok but then they lose the edge and hold. When a defender is flowing away from the OL and seems stuck to them? C'mon. It's holding or the laws of physics were temporarily suspended in the OLs favor. Pick one, haha.

Joined: 12/02/2008

MGoPoints: 8609

WNY in Savannah

November 15th, 2015 at 4:01 PM ^

I agree with a point both of you are making.  The game has "evolved" and the officiating has "evolved" to favor the offense again and again.  The changes in officiating are a huge reason game scores are 55-52 so often these days, when they would have been impossible years ago.  So much blocking today would have been considered holding back in the day.  Defenders are barely allowed to tackle without drawing a flag.  Receivers lay out over the middle today and if they are hit, it's a potential penalty because the receiver was "defenseless".  Back in the day, most receivers wouldn't dare even try because they would get drilled.

We had a discussion in the car this morning about a similar phenomenon with cars.  When I was a kid in Detroit, it was pretty well understood by the kids that if we were dumb enough to get hit by a car, then we were idiots and we got what we deserved.  So we always made sure to stay out of any traffic in the neighborhood.  Now, kids walk down the middle of my street and don't move when a car comes.  They cross a street when they feel like it and expect an oncoming car to stop--which the oncoming car does, because if the car hits the kid, the driver will be at fault (at least here in Savannah).  The point being, we now have rules to protect the "defenseless receiver" or any offensive player when it used to be that the offensive player just shouldn't put himself in that position in the first place.  So the offense is free to do things they couldn't do before.

Holding has become so rare and so arbitrary that it can make the game very frustrating for me to watch.  But the powers that be want more offense because people like lots of scoring and they want minimal penalties because people don't like lots of penalties.  But if the refs decide to call holding on one team more than the other, because they're just not quite as good at it as the other team, that team will have a very hard time winning any game.  My father-in-law likes to say he can tell who will win any NFL game by seeing which team is getting holding calls early on.  He may be overstating things a bit, but he has a point.  It frustrates the heck out of me, but it's the way it is now.

Joined: 09/18/2013

MGoPoints: 638

MGoCombs

November 15th, 2015 at 1:52 PM ^

Criticize/point out deficiencies and blame are too different things. You could do the same for players. Some players didn't play great yesterday, but I wouldn't blame them for nearly losing. I think people do what you were insinuating far too often, but I don't think that was the spirit of OP's post.



Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Joined: 08/13/2009

MGoPoints: 3849

CompleteLunacy

November 15th, 2015 at 1:07 PM ^

They weren't great, but, I wasn't ever truly outraged at something in the game. Yeah, the lack of holding calls was annoying as fuck, but Michigan definitely benefitted from some questionable penalties against IU as well.

But yeah, the holding man. What does it take to call it? There was one play where Brock the color guy said "Harbaugh's yelling for holding but in my opinion there wasn't much there", and once again I rolled my eyes. Because it was a play with a CLEAR hold on an edge defender that helped the RB get to the edge. No call. I guess we just have to accept that's the way it is. As long as they're consistent - and at least they were fairly consistent with their standard yesterday. That's all I ask.

On a tangential note, it's especially annoying that holding is never called in college because in the NFL the standard is completely different. Holding is called frequently, and often on plays that aren't even close to holding. Now, I don't want that in college. But...when one team is gaining huge chunks of yards with assisstance by holding, it's not too much to ask for a flag or two once in awhile.

Joined: 11/13/2010

MGoPoints: 12910

MGoCombs

November 15th, 2015 at 2:03 PM ^

Refs have increasingly become a more critical component of the game with rule changes and replays and they're not adept enough to take on the task. It's surely not an easy job, and frankly I think leagues are asking them to do too much sometimes. Simplify and clarify the rules and I bet you'll see better officiating. That or be stricter in punishment when they are bad.

I don't think Michigan got jobbed anymore than Indiana got jobbed. In the end, the players and fans and sport are all just worse off when officials can't do their jobs.



Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Joined: 08/13/2009

MGoPoints: 3849

HateSparty

November 15th, 2015 at 2:32 PM ^

I was talking to my brother after the game. It appears that calls have consistently gone against us. My brother thinks it's due to Coach's antics on the sideline, he's showing them up. I am not a buyer yet but it makes you wonder.



Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Joined: 12/17/2014

MGoPoints: 27141

DutchWolverine

November 15th, 2015 at 2:48 PM ^

I've wondered the same thing about Harbaugh and if he has rubbed the refs the wrong way. Does that affect the way they call the game? Hard to say. Coach K and Izzo are the biggest cry babies (and sometimes jerks to the refs in coach K's case) and they seem to benefit from it, rather than being hurt by it. Who knows. Hopefully once he has time to build a relationship with them, it gets better.

Joined: 01/09/2011

MGoPoints: 2519

Danwillhor

November 15th, 2015 at 3:08 PM ^

that refs are seemingly harder on the calmer guys. Almost as if they fear what vocal HCs will say to them. Guys that try to buddy up to them beyond pre-game rarely get the obvious makeup calls, etc. Just my observation but I'd rather have a HC that went nuts than calmly spoke to and accepted whatever they were told.

Joined: 12/02/2008

MGoPoints: 8609

mgoDAB

November 15th, 2015 at 3:28 PM ^

IMO it was a gift that the officials called forward progress on the Jourdan Lewis fumble on the KR. If that's ruled a fumble, I don't know if we recover from that. Also, the ghost offensive PI call on the WR vs Clark saved a potential score. I know officiating has been very bad this year, but I feel like the favorable and unfavorable calls and no-calls always balance each other out.



Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Joined: 01/04/2015

MGoPoints: 2887

docwhoblocked

November 15th, 2015 at 4:50 PM ^

I have not felt that there was anywhere as much blatant holding against us in most of the games so far this year.  But yesterday I just kept seeing it over and over.  I thoujght maybe I was over reacting to the close game.  Nope.  There was blatant holding on almost every running play. In regular speed, the D line got push on their O line most of the time and then "some how" they could not get off the blocks to tackle the ball carrier. In the slo mo I could see the O line them grabbing and tackling them on most of these plays. I am not sure how tight the refs are supposed to call these types of plays.  If what Indiana did was ok, then we are not holding enough. 

Joined: 09/05/2010

MGoPoints: 632