Last week's Divisional Games

[BengalYankee]

(01-08-2022, 01:31 PM)rfaulk34 Wrote: I went back and watched that game after posting and it's crazy...as bad as officiating is now, it's so much better than it was back then. 

Two weeks before the Minnesota game, the Bengals hosted the Seahawks in the infamous "You don't live in Cleveland..." game. Late in that game it was tied and the Seahawks (who were pretty bad at that moment) were driving. They had a first and goal inside the 3. Bengals stuff them on 2 runs, then on 3rd down, Fulcher breaks through and tackles the RB for a 1 yd loss. 4th and goal right? Nope. Ref had thrown a flag for a legit false start on the 'hawks but after a ref conference, they said the guy on the end of the line "was allowed to move". WTF?? Even an eligible receiver isn't allowed to lurch forward...

So, no flag, no down, let's do 3rd all over again and wouldn'tyaknowit. They score a TD. Bengals drive down at the end of the game but can't punch it in and their record drops to 7-7. Crush the Oilers 61-7 the next week only to drop the Vikings game in one of the most frustrating games to end a frustrating season. 

In that season, they dropped the opener and then won 4 straight. Did a 2L/1W twice in a row before finishing alternating W/L to end up 8-8. In that Vikes game they turned the ball over 5 times, Ricky Dixon dropped a sure pick 6, right in his hands, on the opening Vikes drive and just kept shooting themselves in the foot time after time--throwing a TD right before the end that would have made it 29-28 but was called back on a sketchy tripping call. Speaking of sketchy calls--getting back to my point about how bad the reffing was then--Vikes receiver Hassan Reddick got upended on the sideline, came down with his arm out of bounds, half his shoulder out of bounds, landed on his head and the ball came out right as he hit the ground, out of bounds, but they called it a catch. Late in the game they were driving, up 22-21 and their fullback fumbled the pitch, picked it up, fumbled again before going down where Carl Zander picked it out of the pile and would have gone the other way for 6, but the ref's called him down and they didn't bother to replay it (replay was also very sketchy back then and no one knew when or if a play would even be reviewed) so the Vikes ended up scoring on that drive to go up 29-21. 

OK! Back to your point *whew*. Yes, Bengals and Vikes went into that game 'win and in, lose and out'. It was a Monday night game and they had cameras in a Packers player's house and a Steelers player's house and they even interviewed them as the game went on. 

If the Bengals had won, they would have hosted the Oilers in the first round and knocked the Steelers out of the playoffs and the Vikings would have been knocked out, allowing GB in. That game was so long ago but it and the season in total were sooooooo frustrating and in some ways, it doesn't feel that long ago.

That was Excellent!!!

For everyone who read rfaulk34's excellent post, keep in mind that in those days the schedule was the schedule meaning the NFL did not switch games at the end of the season that they do now. That scheduled game between the defending AFC Champion Bengals and Vikes was predetermined. A lot different these days.  

As rfaulk34 pointed out this interconference game affected multiple teams from both conferences. These days the divisional games where "you win and you are in" games "generally" affect the two teams, and has 0%  relationship to the outside conference, how boring to the rest of the country. Even most fantasy football leagues are over before the last week, so unless a person is involved in a weekly pick'em system who the F' cares about NFC games like Packers v Lions, Wash v NYGiants, Bears v Vikings, etc. Even the damn Dallas v Philly game bored me to death. 

But it is not only the divisional games only that suck, but it is the scheduling of these games. Outside of the Saturday and Sunday night games, the NFL purposedly plays all teams in the same division play at the same time. So if I wanted to see the  Ravens v Steelers game I can't, because they purposedly play at the same time 1:00 EST. So at 4:00 EST, I am done with the NFL and go watch paint dry rather to see the 4:00 games. 

Seriously, even if you like this BS schedule, why play the Colts v Jags at the same time with the Steelers v Ravens???

Wouldn't be better to play the Colts v Jags at 4:00 EST, where the winner of the 1:00 EST Steelers v Ravens fans can then watch the Colts V Jags in suspense???

I understand if the Colts game was at 1:00 and the Ravens v Steelers game was at 4:00. If the Colts won at 1:00, then no one would watch the boring Ravens v Steelers game because all the backups would be playing. Similarly, this Sunday between the Browns and Bengals, where it is a glorified preseason game.     

The reason why the NFL recently created the Divisional games the last week was because teams would play their scrubs if they were already eliminated against non-divisional rivals. But as we will see between the Bengals v Browns nothing has changed. Even with a higher seeding on the line the Bengals will play their scrubs.