12-13-2017, 04:03 PM
(12-13-2017, 02:46 AM)JS-Steelerfan Wrote: Totally agree with your last two paragraphs.
I also agree that the reputation of a team can have a psychological effect on refs, but I also think that it can have a psychological effect on fans' perceptions. Good teams are simply in position to win more often, whether they get breaks or not. But when they do get those breaks and still do what's necessary to win (which they do more often than bad teams because they're good) it seems like favoritism (intended or otherwise). But when a bad team gets a break and still loses (which they do more often than good teams because they're bad), no one remembers the break.
Case in point - you all are (rightly) pissed off over the iffy holding call that brought back one of your TDs in the last CIN-PIT game. But most of you have already forgotten the Steeler TD return called back on a similarly ticky-tack call. You got almost exactly the same break as we did, but because your team lost (which they do more often than the Steelers this year), the memory of the bad break is far more prominent than the memory of the good one, thus creating the overall perception that the refs favor the Steelers, when an objective view tells a different story.
Like you said though, it's not one or the other. Both dynamics are at play most of the time.
Exactly. I wanted to type something along these lines yesterday but didn't get around to it.
I'd also add that when a series is as lopsided as it had been over the past several years, the attitude going into the game is that "we're going to get screwed" and people look for things that sometimes aren't there.
Example...this thread.
My link is cue'd up to the play in question. It's simply not true, the Steelers were not offsides. But there are Bengals fans that believe so and would probably argue even after seeing the video that they were.
