Bengals-Steelers Rivalry

[Whatever]

(09-16-2018, 06:41 AM)ballsofsteel Wrote: Hello. First of all I don't "live and die for the Steelers". I grew up 25 miles south of Pittsburgh and have been a fan since the 70's. Having said that, What the Steelers do or don't do is not putting any money in my pocket. I come on here to screw around with you guys and have fun. I don't take this crap too seriously.
As far as the NFL favoring the Steelers, you guys have been claiming that for years around here. Is there any proof of this? If there is how is the NFL getting away with it? Some conspiracy theory. What about Dallas and New England along with the Steelers are the most popular teams. Do the NFL favor them? Maybe your right I don't know. I wish the Bengals were in the NFC because I do like them and would root for them.
If the Bengals got to the Super Bowl I would be rooting for them.

It's hard to say with the conspiracy theory stuff.  Some of it can be chalked up to bad officiating.  Other times, it feels like there's an agenda in play.  I don't think it's always necessarily for a specific team, though.  For example, on Thursday, there was that extremely ticky tack PI flag on Kirkpatrick right before the half that set the Ravens up on the 1 yard line.  It was a bs call against us, but that was a tv ratings flag.  Most of the audience would have turned off the tv and went to bed if it was 28-7 at halftime.  28-14 and the Ravens having momentum kept more eyes on the game and the sponsors happy.

For me as a fan, the most frustrating stuff is the stuff that goes against us in the rivalry on the field, then the NFL acknowledges after the fact that they got it wrong.  Three big examples of that were Kevin Huber getting his neck broken on an illegal blindside helmet to helmet hit, the Martavius Bryant phantom TD in our last playoff game, and Joey Porter not being flagged for being out on the field.  Call it right on the field.  

There are other annoyances, too.  For example, since the league started making week 17 games division games, the Steelers have almost always gotten to play the Browns while the Ravens and Bengals beat the crap out of each other.  I don't think I've ever seen Ravens-Steelers and Bengals-Browns the last week of the season.  Logically, every 6 years each team should have a home and away with every other division team, but that's not how it works for some reason.

The one issue that it can be definitively stated that the Steelers got preferential treatment from the league on was when the league voted to not allow individuals with gambling ties to be owners of NFL teams.  The Texans had a minority owner that was forced to immediately sell his stake in the team.  The Rooney family also runs horse tracks and casinos, and the family members who run that part of the family business also had ownership stakes of the Steelers.  Instead of making those people immediately sell their stake of the team, the Steelers allowed Dan Rooney to buy the others out over time as he was able to afford it in order to ensure that he retained control of team.