Are the games fixed ?

[fezziwig]

After all the errors I've seen, lousy calls, no calls, points getting their ways I have to wonder if these games are not controlled. Seems more and more that way since Goodell has taken over IMHO. All that money, corruption is somewhere in the midst.

[Töm87]

There's a lot more fixing in sports in generally that the average Joe could ever imagine.

[fezziwig]

Years ago when I was a teenager I was around some wise guys. And they told me to enjoy the Steelers 79 Super Bowl, it will be their last for a long time. They went on to tell me that games are controlled. To me, it was a couple of guys trying to impress or screw with me but now, I often wonder about that moment.

[sick beats]

After all the errors I've seen, lousy calls, no calls, points getting their ways I have to wonder if these games are not controlled. Seems more and more that way since Goodell has taken over IMHO. All that money, corruption is somewhere in the midst.

I don't think there is even a chance they are not fixed. Now, the question that is unanswered is: "How many are fixed and to what extent?" Remember when Troy took in a fumble vs. San Diego a few years ago? The play was at the end of the game, and they were doing the endless latteral play with no time remaining. They clearly threw the ball backwards, without any question whatsoever, and Troy picked it up off the ground and ran into the endzone. Inexplicably, the refs said no TD, game was over. Taking the 6 points off the board made SD cover with the spread. The swing, in Vegas alone, was $9 million to the bookies. No one can convince me the fix wasn't in. All it would take would be 20k in an airport locker. These refs make good $ (most are doctors, lawyers, etc.) but 20k is still meaningful, and NOTHING for the bookies to pay. Where there is $, there is corruption unless it is really, really safe guarded. I am not sure if the KC game was fixed, as they did call a holding call on SD that they could have easily ignored - and it was a pretty big rush that got wiped out. It's the games that have little meaningful calls on one team, but several on the other that seem suspicious to me.

[sick beats]

There's a lot more fixing in sports in generally that the average Joe could ever imagine.

Remember when the NBA ref came out and said he fixed games and so did all the other refs? That Douche bag Stern's lame @ss response was, "Are you going to believe a convicted fellon?" Well, Stern, yes I will. I trust him a lot more than I do your lying @ss.

[SidSmythe]

I believe the games are tilted, not fixed.

[Chucktownsteeler]

I don't think there is even a chance they are not fixed. Now, the question that is unanswered is: "How many are fixed and to what extent?" Remember when Troy took in a fumble vs. San Diego a few years ago? The play was at the end of the game, and they were doing the endless latteral play with no time remaining. They clearly threw the ball backwards, without any question whatsoever, and Troy picked it up off the ground and ran into the endzone. Inexplicably, the refs said no TD, game was over. Taking the 6 points off the board made SD cover with the spread. The swing, in Vegas alone, was $9 million to the bookies. No one can convince me the fix wasn't in. All it would take would be 20k in an airport locker. These refs make good $ (most are doctors, lawyers, etc.) but 20k is still meaningful, and NOTHING for the bookies to pay. Where there is $, there is corruption unless it is really, really safe guarded. I am not sure if the KC game was fixed, as they did call a holding call on SD that they could have easily ignored - and it was a pretty big rush that got wiped out. It's the games that have little meaningful calls on one team, but several on the other that seem suspicious to me.

Since 9/11 there are no airport lockers.

[sick beats]

I believe the games are tilted, not fixed.

I believe there is both - some tilted, but some tilted so bad that it would have to be considered fixed. I think there is both going on.

[hawaiiansteel]

Kovacevic: Steelers' luck ran dry, but not well

By Dejan Kovacevic
Published: Sunday, Dec. 29, 2013

The kick went wide.

Of course it went wide.

The fumble return for a touchdown was waved off.

Of course it was waved off.

All that luck the Steelers had been hoarding for two weeks — the cumulative equivalent of a five-leaf clover, a rabbit's entire leg and a ball ricocheting right into Franco's hands — all of it disintegrated blow by devastating blow on their TV sets Sunday night.

Chargers 27, Chiefs 24.

And from wherever the Steelers watched that outcome quash what would have been an incredible playoff berth, a few reacted on social media.

Some of it was sadness. Injured Larry Foote tweeted: “Feel like I just got reinjured. My heart is broken.”

Some was anger. Marcus Gilbert, in an apparent lapse of reason, accused Kansas City kicker Ryan Succop — he of the 41-yard miss that would have sent the Steelers to the playoffs — of cheating: “Well? Succop? What was it? Point shaving? Tell me why?”

Yikes.

But the most poignant came from Le'Veon Bell right after the Succop shank: “SMH. Knew it, tho. Simply knew it.”

That's “SMH” as in shake my head. And that's “knew it” as in … well, didn't you, too?

Surreal as this Sunday felt well beyond the Steelers' 20-7 bouncing of the Cleveland Browns, let's get real here for a moment.

Two weeks ago, the Steelers had a 1 percent mathematical chance at the playoffs.

Last week, they needed four games to go their way. All did.

And Sunday, they needed to take care of business and for the Cincinnati Bengals' Andy Dalton to overcome four picks to beat the Baltimore Ravens and for the New York Jets' Geno Smith and his 65.3 QB rating to dance around the Miami Dolphins … and they needed the Kansas City Chiefs in the nightcap to win after Andy Reid decided to rest several starters.

Almost but not quite.

The irrational will blame Succop. That's just weird.

Others will blame Reid. As if the Steelers haven't employed exactly the same practice in recent years.

But most, I suspect, will blame the Steelers for going 0-4, then 2-6, for blowing a game at the Minnesota Vikings' 6-yard line in London, for conceding a 93-yard TD run to Terrelle Pryor, for losing to a Miami team in bitter cold and snow.

“The Dolphins, man,” Ramon Foster was lamenting after the Steelers' victory Sunday. “We lost to the Dolphins.”

They did, but they also flipped 2-6 into 6-2.

And that's why I won't take the blame route. Not now.

The convenient stance to take is that, if only they had beaten one lesser opponent, they would have been OK. Well, no kidding.

But doesn't what followed count for anything, including toward the future?

Sorry, I'm giving credit where due: This wasn't the best edition of the Steelers, to be kind, but you had better believe it was among the most resilient.

“I'm really proud of what's happened,” Ben Roethlisberger said after the victory Sunday. “We had one of the worst records in football, but guys continued to fight, never quit.”

No one led that charge like Roethlisberger. Not on the field, where he didn't miss a snap. Certainly not off it.

But beyond the intangibles, beyond the stubbornly solid foundation built and now possibly rebuilt by Mike Tomlin, there were real reasons to feel that 6-2 surge portends well for 2014 and beyond.

That's especially true on offense, where the scoring average was 28.2 over the final nine games. Antonio Brown is 25, he's signed for the long term, and he's brilliant. Bell grew by bounds each week. The younger fixtures on the O-line stepped up eventually. And hey, give credit — even if through gritted teeth — to Todd Haley for some of that.

“A lot of things got better for us as a unit,” Brown said.

The defense is old and flawed, and it's imperative to address that without sentiment. But I also saw Cam Heyward grow up, Cortez Allen settle down and Jarvis Jones blossom a bit in Week 17 with a game-high nine tackles.

Remember all the angst after London about needing years and years to rebuild?

Not getting that now.

Oh, and for fun, I'll remind that the NFL's best playoff teams tend to have peaked late.

“Imagine that,” Ike Taylor said after the game. “Imagine us and the Bengals with how we're going right now. There would be hell to pay, man.”

Alas, the payment on this season finally came due.

[URL]http://triblive.com/sports/dejankova...#axzz2ozsbH6FH[/URL]

[fezziwig]

I get the fact that we are where are record or win loss column places us. That article doesn't touch on the fact of screwy calls, no calls, the refs being so oblivious to plays that a blind man could see. By the way, the debacle at GreenBay with Hood knocking the ball forward, did the refs make the correct call with giving the ball back to GreenBay ?