Sports_Freak Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 1 hour ago, buddha said: that's another reason why she should say something. because she is a "girl." throw it in their faces. throw it right back at the ol boys club. especially that senile old pervert jerry jones. call bull**** for what it is. break a few eggs. its not like sitting there quietly and never saying anything has ever gotten the lions any respect or favorable decisions ever. lets try a different approach. I kinda understand keeping the football team and the Ford business seperate. For all we know, she may not even be able to threaten the Ford advertising money to the NFL. It may be out of her hands. At least, for all we know... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 10 minutes ago, Mr.TaterSalad said: I still want Brad Allen to be formally investigated by the league. Again, I'm not saying he's another Tim Donaghy, but I want the league to officially prove that to me. But legal gambling makes it so very easy to cheat. Have a distant relative make the wager. But the Lions still covered the point spread so I'm not sure how they would make a straight win or lose bet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddha Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 22 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said: I kinda understand keeping the football team and the Ford business seperate. For all we know, she may not even be able to threaten the Ford advertising money to the NFL. It may be out of her hands. At least, for all we know... im not talking about threatening it, im saying she should remind the league what a valuable partner FOMOCO has been for a very very long time. and that the family sometimes resents feeling like a punching bag for the league. not threatening to pull the ads. the nfl has no shortage of buyers for its ad space. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oblong Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 41 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said: I kinda understand keeping the football team and the Ford business seperate. For all we know, she may not even be able to threaten the Ford advertising money to the NFL. It may be out of her hands. At least, for all we know... Ford is a publicly traded company with shareholders to answer to and a board of directors. She has no position in the company. It’s not a family run business. Ford advertised with the NFL becaise it’s good business to do so. To threaten that because a family member is unhappy about their own business could open the door to shareholder lawsuits. They don’t give a **** about the Lions. They want the stock price to go up and dividends paid. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 16 minutes ago, oblong said: Ford is a publicly traded company with shareholders to answer to and a board of directors. She has no position in the company. It’s not a family run business. Ford advertised with the NFL becaise it’s good business to do so. To threaten that because a family member is unhappy about their own business could open the door to shareholder lawsuits. They don’t give a **** about the Lions. They want the stock price to go up and dividends paid. I would say she has to be very, very careful. I was thinking about this last night, the more people complain about the officials, the less likely we'll get any calls our way. Officials may resent the fact that one of their own is getting publicly hammered. They may all start sticking up for each other and really stick it to the Lions. Or maybe not, I'm not into conspiracy theories. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gehringer_2 Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 (edited) 24 minutes ago, oblong said: Ford is a publicly traded company with shareholders to answer to and a board of directors. She has no position in the company. It’s not a family run business. Ford advertised with the NFL becaise it’s good business to do so. To threaten that because a family member is unhappy about their own business could open the door to shareholder lawsuits. They don’t give a **** about the Lions. They want the stock price to go up and dividends paid. right. Bill Ford Jr tried running the company for a while, decided profits would be better if someone else did. The bit that a lot of people don't realize since Henry II's family has a low profile, is that those magic 'B' shares that control FoMoCo are held by all of Henry I's heirs, both Henry II's and WCF's, while the Lions are/will be fully owned only by WCF and Martha's heirs. Henry II's side of the family has no financial stake in the Lions. Edited January 3 by gehringer_2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Motor City Sonics Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 I think it went more like this Ref 1: Brad, why did you throw that flag Brad: You know why Ref 2: No, I don't Brad: I don't know about you guys but Jerry pays so much better than the league that I can't just let this happen Ref 2: Jerry pays you? Brad: Of course, Dean told me all about it. Dude pays well Ref 3: First time I'm hearing about it Brad: Well nobody reports to you, do they Ref 2: What's the flag for. Brad: To make Jerry happy. Rog will like this too. They are America's team. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichiganCardinal Posted January 3 Author Share Posted January 3 In fairness to Sheila, we don't know what is going on behind the scenes. She doesn't strike me as someone that will air dirty laundry in the public for the sake of appeasing the angry mob, even when the angry mob has a point. If the critique is that she should say more publicly to some degree, then maybe. But that's got to be a very calculated decision and statement, she can't cut the team's nose off to spite their face. She can't just call some impromptu press conference and rip the state of officiating and how the Lions are treated by the NFL in front of cameras and expect things to then get better. Something like that would hurt both herself and the Lions franchise in the grander scheme of NFL operations. Maybe not in a conspiracy theory type of way like was suggested, but I'm sure they're not giving NFL Drafts to cities with franchises that are run by the problem children, they're giving them to franchises who play by the rules and have their outward facing ducks in a row. Likewise, Sheila is on the NFL Fan Engagement Committee, the Major Events Committee, and the NFL Foundation Committee. Rod Wood is on the NFL Investment Committee. These are all things that passively help the Lions and I think are actually ways to get the league to respect the franchise more. Ron Rivera is one of three head coaches on the Competition Committee. When he's fired next Monday, it would be great if Dan Campbell was to be considered for that vacancy... That's the kind of stuff that won't happen though if you make it us versus them in the public eye. The "establishment" will exclude you, and make it us versus them behind closed doors too. When Campbell says that Rod Wood is handling the situation with the league office, I take him at his word. I do think there have been conversations - maybe even heated ones - occurring behind the scenes. I'm just not sure that bringing that private advocacy to the public eye would do more than get us fired up again with the knowledge that the owner has our backs. I'm very confident she does by the last three years of evidence. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddha Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 15 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said: In fairness to Sheila, we don't know what is going on behind the scenes. She doesn't strike me as someone that will air dirty laundry in the public for the sake of appeasing the angry mob, even when the angry mob has a point. If the critique is that she should say more publicly to some degree, then maybe. But that's got to be a very calculated decision and statement, she can't cut the team's nose off to spite their face. She can't just call some impromptu press conference and rip the state of officiating and how the Lions are treated by the NFL in front of cameras and expect things to then get better. Something like that would hurt both herself and the Lions franchise in the grander scheme of NFL operations. Maybe not in a conspiracy theory type of way like was suggested, but I'm sure they're not giving NFL Drafts to cities with franchises that are run by the problem children, they're giving them to franchises who play by the rules and have their outward facing ducks in a row. Likewise, Sheila is on the NFL Fan Engagement Committee, the Major Events Committee, and the NFL Foundation Committee. Rod Wood is on the NFL Investment Committee. These are all things that passively help the Lions and I think are actually ways to get the league to respect the franchise more. Ron Rivera is one of three head coaches on the Competition Committee. When he's fired next Monday, it would be great if Dan Campbell was to be considered for that vacancy... That's the kind of stuff that won't happen though if you make it us versus them in the public eye. The "establishment" will exclude you, and make it us versus them behind closed doors too. When Campbell says that Rod Wood is handling the situation with the league office, I take him at his word. I do think there have been conversations - maybe even heated ones - occurring behind the scenes. I'm just not sure that bringing that private advocacy to the public eye would do more than get us fired up again with the knowledge that the owner has our backs. I'm very confident she does by the last three years of evidence. yeah, all that behind the scenes stuff is really making a difference! meanwhile, jerry jones publicly embarasses the league constantly, fights with roger goodell over everything, talked about replacing goodell publicly, was involved in the gruden email scandal, will make public pronouncements about the officials AND took a shot at the lions in THIS instance. and what difference has it made? do the refs screw the cowboys on a regular basis? does the league disfavor dallas? had it made their lives more difficult in any manner? no. no. and no. dont let yourself get clowned, sheila. rod wood isnt doing **** behind the scenes. and if he is, what difference has it made? the league released a clown show video purporting to show how the LIONS were wrong. nothing was said about the obvious mistake its official made. AND to top it off, the immediate response from those reporters connected to the league was "well akshually, the refs made a mistake on the tripping call previously so stfu lions." if this is rod wood making a difference i would hate to see him be ineffective! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddha Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 the fords have owned the lions almost as long as the cowboys have been in existence! **** jerry jones. **** dallas. and **** the nfl. come on sheila. call out the old boys club. you'll be a hero. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichiganCardinal Posted January 3 Author Share Posted January 3 Jerry Jones is different. I wouldn't want a Jerry Jones as our owner. There is a reason the Cowboys are good but not great and haven't won a Super Bowl in forever. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddha Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 25 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said: Jerry Jones is different. I wouldn't want a Jerry Jones as our owner. There is a reason the Cowboys are good but not great and haven't won a Super Bowl in forever. sure, but your post was all about "look at all the stuff the lions do behind the scenes. they dont ruffle feathers and they get respect with the league because of it." my point is that dallas' ownership does everything it can to make the league look stupid on a regular basis. yet they continue to get much more respect from the league and its officials than the lions ever do. oh boy! we got the draft one year! dallas got it before us. oh boy, we got a super bowl! so did dallas. being nice gets you nothing in business. be ruthless. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Motown Bombers Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 The Cowboys are the most valuable franchise in the NFL. The Lions are among the least although likely to go up. It isn't hard to figure out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichiganCardinal Posted January 3 Author Share Posted January 3 Just now, buddha said: sure, but your post was all about "look at all the stuff the lions do behind the scenes. they dont ruffle feathers and they get respect with the league because of it." my point is that dallas' ownership does everything it can to make the league look stupid on a regular basis. yet they continue to get much more respect from the league and its officials than the lions ever do. oh boy! we got the draft one year! dallas got it before us. oh boy, we got a super bowl! so did dallas. being nice gets you nothing in business. be ruthless. Fair enough. I don't think they get respect from the league now. I'm more so saying the way to get that respect might not be the Jerry Jones way. Certainly it's not the David Tepper or Daniel Snyder way. There has to be some sort of middle ground, and we really don't know what is occurring behind closed doors. I also think the Cowboys are just inherently different, which kind of goes to what MTB just said. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedRamage Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 Here's roughly 16 minutes of therapy that's helping me move on... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben9753 Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 Rod Wood should sent that to the league office. Your move, Roger. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 Look, several teams have gotten boned this season by the officials. And looking at the last several years, it is a continuing problem. It's time the NFL went to full-time officials. Along with making sure they aren't into gambling. And allow video review of selected penalties. Their calls has changed much of the NFC playoff seeding. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddha Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 39 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said: Look, several teams have gotten boned this season by the officials. And looking at the last several years, it is a continuing problem. It's time the NFL went to full-time officials. Along with making sure they aren't into gambling. And allow video review of selected penalties. Their calls has changed much of the NFC playoff seeding. several teams have gotten boned. how often does the nfl release a video explaining that the official was actually right? (while in reality the video actually shows the official was wrong, and the league STILL wont just admit it and move on?) whatever the lions are or arent doing behind the scenes is having no discernible effect on how the league treats them publicly. perhaps a different approach is warranted? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 1 minute ago, buddha said: several teams have gotten boned. how often does the nfl release a video explaining that the official was actually right? (while in reality the video actually shows the official was wrong, and the league STILL wont just admit it and move on?) whatever the lions are or arent doing behind the scenes is having no discernible effect on how the league treats them publicly. perhaps a different approach is warranted? Make the necessary changes to full time officials and a couple reviews per team on penalties. That would solve a huge amount of the human errors. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KL2 Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 59 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said: Look, several teams have gotten boned this season by the officials. And looking at the last several years, it is a continuing problem. It's time the NFL went to full-time officials. Along with making sure they aren't into gambling. And allow video review of selected penalties. Their calls has changed much of the NFC playoff seeding. Full time officials do what to solve the problem? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 1 minute ago, KL2 said: Full time officials do what to solve the problem? They would be more accountable and they would spend more time with the rule book getting calls right. I don't know if it would make a major difference but the optics wouldn't look as bad as part time referees. Use more instant replay. The main thing is to get calls right in real time, not the following week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichiganCardinal Posted January 5 Author Share Posted January 5 I know it's a common criticism, but I'm not sure how much moving them to full-time would help. I don't think the issue is in the number of hours they put in. In-season, they are effectively full-time, putting in more than 40 hours per week when you account for travel (probably even if you don't). They are reviewing film on Wednesdays and Thursdays, flying in on Friday, having meetings galore to prepare for the game on Saturday, and working the game on Sunday, before flying back on Monday and doing it all over again the next week. Before the season, they are putting in hours starting in the Spring, with meetings and trainings all over the place. I would guess it averages to 10+ hours weekly, even accounting for the deadest portions of the offseason. Is there an argument to be made that their work as an accountant or a lawyer or a teacher detracts from their performance as an official? Maybe, but I'm not sure I see the connection. At the end of the day, my performance at work should be evaluated by my supervisor on the basis of my performance at work. Not "yeah but maybe you could do better if you didn't do other things where you're not here"... It would feel weird to have an employer tell me due to a change in policy, I can't play an instrument in a band, or collect and sell knick knacks, or whatever, off the clock... For the record I do neither of those things... If I did though, I'd probably feel like those things make me a better employee, not worse, and I'm sure NFL officials feel the same about their "other" jobs... Not to mention I'm just not sure what they would do year-round that they're not already doing in terms of preparation for games. What I think accounts for the largest portion of criticisms in NFL officiating is really irreparable, and it's just in the evaluation and promotion systems in place, and in how people get good at any skill - repetition. You look at MLB, NBA, or the NHL, and there is a tiered system in place to promote officials. An MLB official has probably worked over 1000 baseball games in their life before working his first MLB game. By the time they are in AAA, they are being evaluated in over 100 games per year (900+ innings and who knows how many pitches) to see if they're ready... NBA and NHL is less so, but still probably well over 600 games... An NFL official though? If we generalize and assume an NFL official is hired at 35 after working ten years of college football and five years of high school football, that means they've worked about 170 football games in their life ((12 games * 10 seasons) + (10 games * 5 seasons))... At the tail end where they're being looked at closely, there are still only 12-15 opportunities each season to really evaluate these officials... And if they're in an off-ball position like the back three, there are plenty of games where they don't even make a call! You can make them full-time, but you can't create more high level football games for them or their recruits to officiate. But then you have problems like Brad Allen not paying attention to who he is talking to. That's not fixed by telling him he can't be the CEO of some nonprofit. He just needs to do better. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sports_Freak Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 8 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said: I know it's a common criticism, but I'm not sure how much moving them to full-time would help. I don't think the issue is in the number of hours they put in. In-season, they are effectively full-time, putting in more than 40 hours per week when you account for travel (probably even if you don't). They are reviewing film on Wednesdays and Thursdays, flying in on Friday, having meetings galore to prepare for the game on Saturday, and working the game on Sunday, before flying back on Monday and doing it all over again the next week. Before the season, they are putting in hours starting in the Spring, with meetings and trainings all over the place. I would guess it averages to 10+ hours weekly, even accounting for the deadest portions of the offseason. Is there an argument to be made that their work as an accountant or a lawyer or a teacher detracts from their performance as an official? Maybe, but I'm not sure I see the connection. At the end of the day, my performance at work should be evaluated by my supervisor on the basis of my performance at work. Not "yeah but maybe you could do better if you didn't do other things where you're not here"... It would feel weird to have an employer tell me due to a change in policy, I can't play an instrument in a band, or collect and sell knick knacks, or whatever, off the clock... For the record I do neither of those things... If I did though, I'd probably feel like those things make me a better employee, not worse, and I'm sure NFL officials feel the same about their "other" jobs... Not to mention I'm just not sure what they would do year-round that they're not already doing in terms of preparation for games. What I think accounts for the largest portion of criticisms in NFL officiating is really irreparable, and it's just in the evaluation and promotion systems in place, and in how people get good at any skill - repetition. You look at MLB, NBA, or the NHL, and there is a tiered system in place to promote officials. An MLB official has probably worked over 1000 baseball games in their life before working his first MLB game. By the time they are in AAA, they are being evaluated in over 100 games per year (900+ innings and who knows how many pitches) to see if they're ready... NBA and NHL is less so, but still probably well over 600 games... An NFL official though? If we generalize and assume an NFL official is hired at 35 after working ten years of college football and five years of high school football, that means they've worked about 170 football games in their life ((12 games * 10 seasons) + (10 games * 5 seasons))... At the tail end where they're being looked at closely, there are still only 12-15 opportunities each season to really evaluate these officials... And if they're in an off-ball position like the back three, there are plenty of games where they don't even make a call! You can make them full-time, but you can't create more high level football games for them or their recruits to officiate. But then you have problems like Brad Allen not paying attention to who he is talking to. That's not fixed by telling him he can't be the CEO of some nonprofit. He just needs to do better. That's true but the Cowboy game was a unique incident.Thetlre are many games where the TV announcers show a replay and it shows what the call really should have been. Have officials watching each and every game and buzz down when a call is made wrong. What I'm getting at is just do something to get calls right. What they're doing isn't working, just do something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichiganCardinal Posted January 5 Author Share Posted January 5 6 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said: That's true but the Cowboy game was a unique incident.Thetlre are many games where the TV announcers show a replay and it shows what the call really should have been. Have officials watching each and every game and buzz down when a call is made wrong. What I'm getting at is just do something to get calls right. What they're doing isn't working, just do something. I'm okay with a Sky Judge. I think the barrier there is what we saw when they made pass interference reviewable in 2019. It's just so incredibly hard to review subjective things like holding and pass interference, where the question is not "yes or no" or "in bounds or out of bounds", but rather "who contacts who" or "is that enough restriction". If I put 100 NFL officials in a room and play a clip of a pass interference that wasn't called, how many should have to raise their hands to say "yes this is pass interference" for them to reverse the call? 51? 75? 90? Each Sky Judge would have their own threshold to pass in order to flip a call like that, which I don't think is good for the game either, as we pause the game for a play to go into a black box that then tells us how to proceed. I'm not saying that the state of officiating is strong by any means, I just don't think there are easy solutions to many of the problems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr.TaterSalad Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 57 minutes ago, buddha said: several teams have gotten boned. how often does the nfl release a video explaining that the official was actually right? (while in reality the video actually shows the official was wrong, and the league STILL wont just admit it and move on?) whatever the lions are or arent doing behind the scenes is having no discernible effect on how the league treats them publicly. perhaps a different approach is warranted? I see no reason why Sheila can't hire her own private investigator and retain legal counsel to investigate the actions of Brad Allen and ensure he's not another Tim Donaghy. It would be a great way to publicly embarrass and humiliate Goodell and the league by having one of your own franchises and ownership groups launching a public investigation into the leagues handling of the situation and into the referee who made the call. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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