Mr. Scot

There aren't always "consequences", but occasionally there is scapegoating.

Mentioned it elsewhere, but will repeat here that I don't believe "owner's preference" should be any sort of factor in these decisions. David Tepper needs to keep his dumb ass out of the assistant coach hiring process.

NFL officiating has absolutely gone to sh-t in the last ten years or so. Instructions like the one I mentioned above are probably part of that, but for whatever reason, the quality has just become terrible.

I don't know how many people remember, but over the last few years the NFL has told its officials to refrain from calling offensive holding except in absolutely blatant cases. Said directive came after a down year in offensive production, if I remember correctly. What constitutes "blatant" is, of course, a judgment call. That particular bit of guidance tends to really show up in the playoffs. And although they'd probably never admit to it, one of the things a lot of offensive line coaches do Is help their guys learn exactly how they can better get away with committing such penalties. Personal opinion: I'd guess highly regarded Eagles OL coach Jeff Stoutland could probably show you a thing or two about that.

I've stated before, and will state again, that I don't believe the NFL is rigged. This particular incident though was an example of absolutely gross incompetence. It easily goes down as one of the worst things I've seen in over fifty years of watching football. I won't be at all surprised if somebody is fired over it. You could make a pretty good argument that somebody should be.

Post game... Someone also edited the City of Cincinnati's Wikipedia page to show Travis Kelce as the mayor

Ah...

I have no idea who he is

Quoting Anderson, Riot Report sums up our current situation as follows...

I've always found it funny how the NFL goes from rigged to not rigged whenever the bad calls benefit us.

I actually like Bradley, but I know a lot of people don't.

I'm certain he wins every intelligence contest he judges

And if we had gone with one of the young options, I could have seen that making a little sense. An experienced head coach? And one who's got a lot better record of winning than most of the people associated with this team? Not so much

About everything we've seen is speculation. Will be nice to see some actual headlines.

Is he related to Wax Lipps?

Part of a conversation with Josina Anderson regarding the Fangio deal...

I'm more bothered by this... What kind of successful standing as far as a football decision maker does David Tepper have that would make him think he should have a say in who Reich wants on his staff? I expect Reich will turn out to be a good hire, but Tepper shouldn't let that go to his head and start thinking he's actually qualified to give advice now. To put it more succinctly: Good job choosing a head coach... Now butt out before you screw up a good thing, dumbass

Now this is where I might have an actual concern... Ownership meddling in a head coach's assistant hiring process is a bad thing, especially when it's with an experienced head coach who's got a way better record as a winner than said owner does. That would be bad. Tepper should let Reich hire whomever he wants. I get that the Matt Rhule experience burned them, but Frank Reich isn't Matt Rhule. And if you treat him like he is, you're the dumbsh-t, not him. On the flipside, nobody gives a flying rat's ass if you start off pursuing one candidate but end up with another. It happens at a pretty much annual basis to many many teams, but can you recall anybody having a crisis of confidence over something like this in the past? Probably not, because that didn't happen. Nobody cares, and trying to make something like that out to be a big deal is silly. Side Note: It did happen to us once before. Specifically, Ron Rivera wanted to hire a prior colleague of his but his current employer wouldn't give permission, so instead Rivera ended up hiring someone he didn't really know. The guy he wanted? Steve Wilks The guy he got? Sean McDermott Wasn't exactly a disaster, now was it?

I didn't, but somebody before me did.

Yeah, he was having a great game. But all anybody's gonna remember is that.

It's only fixed when your team loses. They did a sh-t job. It happens.

Did you see how his knee bent?

Prior to that... So basically Reich was good with Fangio or Bradley but ownership wants Fangio.

Man, what a sh-tty way to end your season.

What in the actual hell...