ESPN First Take, Scoreboard mishap:mistake or cheating?

[TriplecHamp]

honestly its funny how the media creates conspiracy theorys for the the fans and people who don't think too much. The situation seems easily explainable and doesn't need a cheating or foul play tag next to it.


When the fumble happened, the ravens needed a brief explanation to the spot of the ball, and the refs told Haurbaugh that it was marked where the player went down, not where the ball went out. Now if an NFL coach needs this explained i'm sure a scoreboard worker does to, but he can't talk directly to refs. So this guy has 2 options on what to display on the board since he's not sure of what the deal is down there. Display the spot of the ball that favors the pats, or the spot of the ball that favors the ravens. He chose to mark it as 1st down which clearly is the ravens favor in this situation. Now when it comes to 4th down everyone near the chains knows the situation, but the kicking assistant and Cundiff are off practicing. The assistant would be watching the scoreboard for Cundiff, which is why he thought it was 3rd down. This is where the breakdown in communication really happened. No one had came over to tell him that the scoreboard was a play behind, so when it turned 4th down, he still thought 3rd. Now Belichick and crew would be watching the other side of the field at this point, monitoring what the Ravens were going to do. Bill had timeouts to kill and if the Ravens looked like they were going to try something he was ready to use one. From the other side you could probably easily see the panic when everyone went to go find Cundiff since he was still practicing and wasn't ready for the kick. This is why when someone asked Bill if he was going to ice him, he decided to let it play out since he knew the kicker had not been prepared to go out immediately and was being rushed. They hike the ball he misses his kick and the rest is history.


The scoreboard worker actually gave the ravens the benefit of the doubt and gave the down and position he thought was right, and wasn't corrected in time by someone. The errors from this entire thing lie on the coaching staff and Cundiff. The coaching staff did not communicate the situation well enough for everyone to be on the same page. Harbaugh rushed his kicker rather than taking a timeout to settle it down. And Cundiff missed a chip shot. Plain and simple no conspiracy what so ever.

no, BB cheated

 

[BradyFTW!]

We even cheated back in the 3-11 days of the 70's!!! Wonder why it didn't work....

It did work. Cheating is why they didn't go 1-13. It's been a slow climb, but the Patriots are living proof that you can cheat your way from the bottom through to the top.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Yeah you're right, I probably should have left that out in my mini-rant. It's more that they are looking for total numbers for their ratings, so if they lose 1,000 hardcore fans but add 1,000,000 casual fans in the process, it's a huge win for them. It's all strictly business, which is based on the sheer volume of viewers, readers, listeners and web clicks. The babbling fools are more likely to get people talking about them, whether it be amongst co-workers on a break or fans on a message board than any serious X's and O's show ever will, and that buzz is the free advertising they need to bring people back to watch again and again.

Quoted for truth. Unfortunately, the best way to capture the mass audience will always be to appeal to ignorance by attacking excellence (in a way that ignorant people can understand). For the past decade or so, that has been the Patriots.

 

[goheels22002]

Rob Parker is a racist who the hates Patriots and especially Tom Brady because they are as "white" as it's gonna get in the league. Rob Parker is the same racist moron who assumes people(mostly blacks) hate Tim Tebow because he is a white man playing like a black man, when that is far from the case.

What are you talking about? Race has zero to do with any of this, or with how football works.

For any accomplished white player or coach, you can name ten black players or coaches just as accomplished, and vice versa.

There is no "way" that a black man or a white man plays the game. There have been wooden Indian black Super Bowl QBs (Doug Williams) and white QBs (Tom Brady), and running black QBs and running white QBs if that is where you're going with your misinformed Tim Tebow line. What, did Randall Cunningham or Michael Vick play like Fran Tarkenton? Hogwash.

There is no place on this board for this sort of baloney.

Black, white, hispanic, Asian, Pacific Islander, or whatever, we do not care. If they play for the Jets we hate them and if they play for the Patriots, we love them.

Does it matter what race or nationality the guy running the scoreboard was on Sunday? No. We don't even know, but he's got a game ball today. He flickered the lights, changed the downs, flashed a subliminal message "Wide Left" and confused the hell out of Billy Cundiff. Pay the man!

 

[Halifax_Pats_Fan]

...enough...

10 chars....

 

[PatsFan24]

Why do posters here continue to get so upset about what the media says? What is the big deal? When you get upset and write and talk about it then it just proves they are doing their job. They want people to react and talk about them.

 

[SaCaCh]

honestly its funny how the media creates conspiracy theorys for the the fans and people who don't think too much. The situation seems easily explainable and doesn't need a cheating or foul play tag next to it.


When the fumble happened, the ravens needed a brief explanation to the spot of the ball, and the refs told Haurbaugh that it was marked where the player went down, not where the ball went out. Now if an NFL coach needs this explained i'm sure a scoreboard worker does to, but he can't talk directly to refs. So this guy has 2 options on what to display on the board since he's not sure of what the deal is down there. Display the spot of the ball that favors the pats, or the spot of the ball that favors the ravens. He chose to mark it as 1st down which clearly is the ravens favor in this situation. Now when it comes to 4th down everyone near the chains knows the situation, but the kicking assistant and Cundiff are off practicing. The assistant would be watching the scoreboard for Cundiff, which is why he thought it was 3rd down. This is where the breakdown in communication really happened. No one had came over to tell him that the scoreboard was a play behind, so when it turned 4th down, he still thought 3rd. Now Belichick and crew would be watching the other side of the field at this point, monitoring what the Ravens were going to do. Bill had timeouts to kill and if the Ravens looked like they were going to try something he was ready to use one. From the other side you could probably easily see the panic when everyone went to go find Cundiff since he was still practicing and wasn't ready for the kick. This is why when someone asked Bill if he was going to ice him, he decided to let it play out since he knew the kicker had not been prepared to go out immediately and was being rushed. They hike the ball he misses his kick and the rest is history.


The scoreboard worker actually gave the ravens the benefit of the doubt and gave the down and position he thought was right, and wasn't corrected in time by someone. The errors from this entire thing lie on the coaching staff and Cundiff. The coaching staff did not communicate the situation well enough for everyone to be on the same page. Harbaugh rushed his kicker rather than taking a timeout to settle it down. And Cundiff missed a chip shot. Plain and simple no conspiracy what so ever.

Perfectly said and almost 100% how it happen and why Harbaugh said it was a non issue...it was on him for not calling a TO. You can watch the inside the NFL video and see the coaches knew what down and reacted right away and only a few players wondered what down because they weren't really paying attention and only glancing at the scoreboard.

 

[tuckeverlasting]

if espn is going to accuse the pats of cheating, the least they can do is cite the rule that was broken.

 

[oldskool138]

...enough...

Yeah, that was a pretty lousy Jennifer Lopez movie.

 

[brdmaverick]

my take:

Honest Mistake


Would the scoreboard operator really think that putting the wrong "down" would help a guy physically miss a field goal? Let's be serious.

 

[captain insano]

all score boards are run by the nfl not the team. let me guess the worst show on tv didnt mention that did they?

 

[oldskool138]

all score boards are run by the nfl not the team. let me guess the worst show on tv didnt mention that did they?

The clocks are run by the NFL (play and game clock). The scoreboard is run by the home team (score, down and distance, etc).