CHA_CHING

Andddd we got away with a blatant facemask on Goff at the red zone right before it was tied up 20-20. If the refs call that, we're down 24-20 and trying to win the game with a TD.

Bad calls happened on both sides, in fact most games have bad calls in them. The Patriots could've screamed about non-calls against KC (in the 4th quarter and OT, the Chiefs were getting away with blatant pass interference in the AFCCG), but they managed to overcome them. It has pained me since that loss that the entire conversation of what went wrong is centered around that one bad non-call. Good teams overcome bad calls, we succumbed to it, unfortunately. The refs didn't make our offense do diddly poo in the second quarter after going up 13-0 and then again in the second half after going up 20-10. We had chance after chance after chance to really throttle those frauds, but we didn't, we let them hang around in the game with enough time to freaking tie it.

Go back and watch tape of the games from the final stretch of the season and both playoff games. Something went wrong with the offense beginning with the Dallas game and they never recovered. Fans blame the refs on everything, but something was wrong with this team and there is no denying it.

I started to panic back in December with that mess against Pittsburgh. We were dominating that team in the first half, then did nothing in the second half after going up 24-14. A 10 point lead was blown and yet the defense was trying to move heaven and earth (2 stops on 4th down and a turnover, not counting the turnover on Pittsburgh's final drive) to win that game, and yet our offense STILL couldn't really do anything. A pass interference penalty was our biggest help to getting that final TD to barely squeak that game out. That was the moment for me I knew we were going to struggle in the playoffs.

IMO the Rams game went eerily similar to the Steelers game; jumped out to a nice lead, opportunity was there to blow them out, blown 10 point lead, offense struggling in the second half to really do anything (and no real offensive adjustments. This was obvious in the second half vs the Rams. After going up 20-10, they had completely shut us down to the point we needed a miracle catch by Ginn as our last real meaningful play of the game.)

I'm tired of talking about the non-call. Everyone seems to forget that many of us were panicking back in December cause we watched this offense just collapse after Dallas beat them down and sadly exposed that our offense only had 2 playmakers worth worrying about (Kamara and Thomas). Every game after that was a struggle; Tampa Bay, Carolina, Pittsburgh, Philly and sadly yes, the Rams gave our offense serious problems. This was all happening before that egregious non-call. Hence why I absolutely will not believe they some how would've beat the Patriots.

That one bad call has completely overshadowed everything leading up to the point that had went wrong for us in that game. It also overshadows that something went horribly wrong with the offense beginning with the Dallas game. No one is talking about either of these things anymore. It's all about that one bad non-call.