Two Interesting Thoughts on Penalties
by RabbitSC on Dec 3, 2011 10:57 AM PST
Email
Print
Bumped - P
As I sit here watching (for some reason) the UConn-Cincy game, where both teams are racking up roughly one bazillion yards in penalties, I had a thought about USC's penalties this season. Specifically, how few of them we seemed to have compared to past years. I was curious how we ranked in the Pac-12 in penalty yards, so I looked it up.
USC finished first in the Pac-12 in penalty yards, with 50.0 per game. Utah finished second with 53.4. Very cool. Yet another sign that the ad hominem Lane Kiffin haters are off base. Kiffin's team is playing disciplined football. And this despite breaking in three new starters on the offensive line (and testing out two other guards as starters), moving a guard in to center, and playing a ton of freshmen on both sides of the ball.
But what's really interesting is our national ranking. First in the Pac-12 is good for 61st overall. And where do the other Pac-12 teams come in?
Utah - 71
Stanford - 86
UCLA - 100
Oregon - 102
Washington - 104
WSU - 106
Arizona - 107
Colorado - 111
Oregon St - 115
Cal - 119
Arizona St - 120
Of additional note is ASU's epic 85.0 yards per game, a truly impressive number dwarfing Cal's respectable 72.4.
But seriously... nine Pac-12 teams ranked 100th or worse in penalty yards? NO Pac-12 teams in the upper 50% of the FBS? That's a joke. That's insane. And it's not coincidence. Pac-12 officiating is doing this.
We've always talked smack about Pac-12 officiating. There were interesting analyses done to show that conference teams received statistically significantly fewer penalties than their season averages when they were playing USC every year from 2002-2009. Not really surprising. You see the same effect in the NBA playoffs. But have we ever seen such an obvious failure? Such a clear indication that Pac-12 officiating operates on a different standard from every other major conference?
And make no mistake, this is on Larry Scott's new crew. Last year only two Pac-12 teams ranked 100th or worse: USC and Oregon. It appeared that Scott was making serious changes in officiating, and I had hope that we might actually see improved performance this year. Well, things are worse. The refs clearly failed the eye test this season, and the numbers show something is wrong, period. GUYS... YOU'RE THROWING TOO MANY FLAGS.
Is there ever going to be a positive change in Pac-12 officiating? Ever?
This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of Conquest Chronicles' writers or editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan though, which is as important as the views of Conquest Chronicles' writers or editors.
22 comments
|
2 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
They throw silly personal fouls constantly
while Oregon holds on almost every offensive play. New Motto: Pac 12 — the conference of fail. Brought to you by the Ford Pinto.
or the Chevy Vega
both cars ‘gasoline tanks with four wheels’
Oh, Mama, can this really be the end
To be stuck inside of Mobile
With the Memphis blues again
-R. Zimmerman
I have no issues with high penalties being called
If there are flags, there are flags. Call what you see. What I don’t appreciate? Is this bullshit with over-penalizing one team versus the other. I don’t feel like outside of the USC-UCLA game quite a few years ago USC’s gotten the majority of the calls their way. And usually the most talented team gets penalized the least as the opposition struggles to deal with their speed and strength. Instead they get penalized more, which is baffling.
"I got my pregnant wife (the Yankee fan) with me. Hoping my kid learns to kick her everytime the Mets score." -Schifftis-
Officiating at Coliseum
The officiating at the LA Coliseum this year was consistently inconsistent.
Actually, it was so poor that I considered starting a thread on this blog dedicated to missed calls, clock issues, and inappropriate officiating action.
Not one game went by where there was not some sort of significant officiating error which significantly impacted the game.
In fact, the officiating was so bad at one point that I actually began considering dropping the season tickets out of frustration that the atheleticism on the field was being negated by the poor officiating.
Here’s my list of inappropriate actions:
Multiple episodes where the field judges inappropriately spot the ball at the end of the play.
Penalty thrown on 1st down with 2nd down and 7 instead of 2nd down and 15
USC being called South Carolina (Syracuse game) – happened TWO TIMES by the same guy.
Multiple overturned field calls by replay booth just in one game alone.
Missed TD calls where the field judges failed to post a TD at the end of a game.
Missed Pass Interference calls where Woods was getting mugged and yet no PI call.
An inappropriate flag for intentional grounding against MB7
Clock inappropriately running off time or not running off time.
There is no excuse of this type of slip shod officiating where these games and their outcome are worth millions of dollars.
The counter would be that the P12 officials are doing a better job accurately calling appropriate penalties
compared to other conferences. But, the game is clearly less enjoyable when too many flags are thrown, and we have seen tons of questionable calls in P12 games. So, I tend to agree with the OP.
A Quick Note for the Quitters
No comment from this thread will be deleted. You will have to own them when we get it turned around and beat Southern Cal. You will never ride the bandwagon when we come back. Not on BN. GO BRUINS.
by Nestor on Sep 4, 2010 9:24 PM CDT
Just saw a wonderful moment in LSU-UGA
LSU player throws a punch, connects. No flag. But in the Pac-12, our players can’t even celebrate, flex, anything. USC gets called for some of the most heinous PF calls I’ve ever seen.
"I got my pregnant wife (the Yankee fan) with me. Hoping my kid learns to kick her everytime the Mets score." -Schifftis-
I was shocked they didn't flag him up
That was not a ‘two guys getting chippy’ kind of moment.
"Ain't no tuition for having no ambition." -Brandon Carswell
SEC understands
where the money is, they can’t let LSU lose this game.
"I got my pregnant wife (the Yankee fan) with me. Hoping my kid learns to kick her everytime the Mets score." -Schifftis-
see: Illegal block in the back - no call
Fight On! Beat everybody but us!
And if you missed it
LSU kick returner actually dropped the ball going into the end zone, should have been a fumble! MeSean style. Announcers said nothing, nor did the replay booth guy.
"I got my pregnant wife (the Yankee fan) with me. Hoping my kid learns to kick her everytime the Mets score." -Schifftis-
yeah well he is called the honey badger
so its likely he don’t care.
That stupid meme
"I got my pregnant wife (the Yankee fan) with me. Hoping my kid learns to kick her everytime the Mets score." -Schifftis-
CBS comment during 4th quarter
CBS sports announcers mentioned the questionable call at the end of the run.
That looks to me more like a celebratory Heisman pose.
That alone was worth calling back the TD, right?
Just like last year?
Makes me wonder when we can see the replay
The SEC, where Offensive (sic) Football is played..............:)
LSU becomes the FIRST SEC school since 2002 to have ZERO first downs in the first half.
BTW, offense 0 points and approximately 10 total yards
Oh, Mama, can this really be the end
To be stuck inside of Mobile
With the Memphis blues again
-R. Zimmerman
Georgia's offense is lame two
its like they have 4 plays — dive, draw, screen, and WR Streaks. Its like 1997 John Robinson offense.
To be fair
Georgia receivers have dropped 2 sure TD passes. Murray looks like a good QB to me.
Fight On! Beat everybody but us!
It'd be really interesting to see if there are differences in each Pac-12 team's penalty yardage between their conference and nonconference schedule.
Then we might have a better idea if it’s “our” officials versus our teams themselves. As DFWTrojan shrewdly suggested, if Pac-12 referees throw more flags, it could be because they’re better about enforcing the rules. To the extent that we could do the same kind of analysis for other conferences’ teams, we might be able to answer that question as well.
"Guess what? I AM THE MANAGER."
I wouldn't know how to do that comparison
But OOC games use Pac-12 refs half the time, and refs from the other conference half the time. So on average, each Pac-12 team plays 10.5 games with Pac-12 refs and 1.5 games with other refs. And a lot of those 1.5 games per team are against FCS teams, where the statistics are basically meaningless. So there wouldn’t be a very large sample.
"Ain't no tuition for having no ambition." -Brandon Carswell
Consistently inconsistent
The thought of this type of analysis crossed my mind also. However, you would need to dissect the inconsistent behavior of the referees between officiating teams. That’s hard to do because I can not locate any archival data showing the identification of the referree making the calls and the conference affiliation.
I attempted to locate the names of the referrees and officiating teams for the USC games, but I could not even locate that information.
I was interested in the names of the officials because of the considerable discussion on this board about the blown calls.
The guy who called us “South Carolina” during the Syracuse game appears to be a East Coast guy. I’m assuming he was from the ACC.
It was this blog that first broke the story about the Notre Dame player turned referee who blew a call for USC during the Stanford game.
The Stanford blown call could have cost USC the top spot in the conference.
You can get the exact names of the refs for each game
On the official stat sheets the schools release after the games. Here’s one for the USC-Stanford game:
http://www.gostanford.com/sports/m-footbl/stats/2011-2012/stanfb08.html
Referee: Michael Batlan • Umpire: R. DiBernardo • Linesman: Edwin Walker • Line judge: Tim Messuri • Back judge: Joe Johnston • Field judge: Jeffery Yock • Side judge: Brad Glenn • Scorer: Stan Granch •
"Ain't no tuition for having no ambition." -Brandon Carswell
While I completely agree with this post
There is always a bright side. The bullshit questionable excessive celebration penalty on Jake Locker gave us 0-12
If ya can't get your Dick Enright, get your Dick Harter!
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
