I'm not a conspiracy theorist but ...
I'm really starting to wonder if somehow Harbaugh pissed off the refs at some point in the past. This no longer seems random. This seems like a definitive trend. The officiating recently (and in past key games like OSU 2016) has been anywhere from questionable to atrocious against UM. Today was a key example and it really kept NW in the game. This year's team is not that undisciplined. The NCAA really needs to adopt a something similar to the referee system to the NFL. They got all the money in the world to make it happen.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:41 PM ^
There were some awful calls today. Some beyond belief. That being said, that’s not why NW was in this game until the end. That’s on us sleepwalking through 2 quarters of football
September 29th, 2018 at 10:45 PM ^
Eh...no. Look at the box score. This game was close almost entirely due to our penalties.
We put up 376 yards, 8.2 ypa, 4.3 ypc, held NW to 202 yards. Held them to just 1 sack. We had no turnovers. We were over 2.4 yards per play better (5.69ypp to 3.20ypp).
If you didn't look at the score, and didn't look at penalties, this looks like a game in which we pulled away in the 2nd half and won by 17-ish. That would be reinforced if someone told you that Northwestern didn't score after 12:56 in the 2nd Quarter. NW was kept in this game by a positive net of 75 penalty yards.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:57 PM ^
Yeah, but most of the penalties were more or less legit. The Higdon holding penalty should get someone suspended if not fired, but our DBs also committed some pretty out-of-control PI and got legitimately flagged.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:03 PM ^
Are they anymore legit than the obvious holds not called on UM's d-line? The non call on Chase getting held on their last drive was one of the worst no calls I have ever seen
September 29th, 2018 at 11:53 PM ^
You can say that again.
September 30th, 2018 at 2:01 AM ^
Are they anymore legit than the obvious holds not called on UM's d-line? The non call on Chase getting held on their last drive was one of the worst no calls I have ever seen
September 30th, 2018 at 9:14 AM ^
How is this comment triple posted across two accounts?
September 30th, 2018 at 9:38 AM ^
MgoBlue96 is um fan from sydney's alternate account obviously.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:59 PM ^
I nearly blew out my shoulder throwing my hat across the room on that play. But when I rewound it to show my wife unfortunately, it looked like a borderline hold followed by an award winning "dive" by Chase. A penalty certainly could've been called, but the no-call was understandable considering the time of the game
September 30th, 2018 at 10:30 AM ^
what does time of game have to do with it?
September 30th, 2018 at 11:14 AM ^
That was my take as well, I really don't see what everyone is up in arms about, looked like Winovich tripped...
September 30th, 2018 at 11:07 AM ^
Exactly.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:04 PM ^
Are they anymore legit than the obvious holds not called on UM's d-line? The non call on Chase getting held on their last drive was one of the worst no calls I have ever seen
September 30th, 2018 at 12:08 AM ^
See above post.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:05 PM ^
Besides that play, we had two good punt returns brought back on very dubious block-in-the-back penalties. Those two calls cost us a lot of field position. On one of them, I rewound the play multiple times and never could find where the penalty was.
September 30th, 2018 at 9:14 AM ^
It was on Hombre Thomas when he got tackled
September 29th, 2018 at 11:06 PM ^
Then what about the constant flagrant holding of our DE's right in front of the refs without any calls? It's ridiculous. A 13 year old could do a better job.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:11 PM ^
I agree with this, yeah. There's been a baffling call (or three - SMU) every game, but many of our penalties have also been fair, or at least legitimate enough that a random, reasonable ref could be expected to call the same thing.
I wasn't really meaning to say that we weren't at all culpable in the game being close, but more so that I'd kind of rather have the penalty issue than, say, one or more sides of the ball looking broken. The latter wasn't true at all - the offense looked decent, especially given a step up in competition, and the defense and special teams looked great.
September 30th, 2018 at 12:04 AM ^
Most were legit and they missed a personal foul call on Higdon when he got up and shoved a player well after the play ended. That potentially could have cost us the game too.
September 30th, 2018 at 2:00 AM ^
Dude, it's not that the penalties aren't legit. It's that the games aren't being called proportionately. Refs simply don't call as many ticky tack penalties on other teams. Every team out there commits penalties all game long, we receive a shockingly disproportionate number of penalties. For example, OSU wasn't called for any penalties in 2016, there were posts made with clear examples of refs looking directly at the the penalty as it occured, like 10 of them, yet they didn't receive a SINGLE penalty for any of them.
If you're going to penalize Michigan for breaking the rules, fine, but penalize our opponents too.
October 1st, 2018 at 11:00 AM ^
The 2016 osu game was a reffing abomination. That has absolutely nothing to do with 2018. If we get called for 11 penalties and 9 are correct calls, that's the problem. I am sure almost every fanbase out there says the same things we do. "We had more injuries, we never get the calls, we got screwed."
I am not going to join in with the crowd that says all the refs are out to get us when we are clearly shooting ourself in the foot way more often than we should. Yes there have been bad calls against us but shit happens, worry about the 9 times we f'ed up, not the 2 that the refs sucked.
Michigan's hyper aggressive defense is bound to get more penalties than a soft coverage team. In man to man it appears our guys are taught to grab the receivers.
In your defense that was the worst holding call I've ever seen on Higdon though, but it's still all the other flags we are getting that bug me.
September 30th, 2018 at 12:21 AM ^
Can you define more or less? Not trying to be an ass but we get no calls at home or on the road. I was at the game and the phantom hold was just blatant and before the sack to end the game they almost decapitated Winovich. Some penalties called against us were the difference between 3 to 7 points. So, please define,”your” more or less. Please.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:55 PM ^
This game was close almost entirely due to our penalties.
That, and our inability to score TDs on two 3rd Q drives on which we had first and goal. A good offense gets 14 points and we got 6.
September 30th, 2018 at 12:05 AM ^
Our offense was at 24th in S&P as of this week. That's good in my book. We can't keep moving the goalposts on what counts as "good" each week just because we want to complain.
Basing your entire assessment of a unit off of two drives is not smart. Penn State had a 1st and 10 on OSU's 17 and came away with only 3 points - do they not have a good offense?
Northwestern had the 27th ranked S&P defense. We had 376 yards at 5.7ypp, 1 sack, no turnovers. The offense was good tonight.
September 30th, 2018 at 7:33 AM ^
I think the point to be made there is that, can't settle for 3, twice in those situations. Touchdowns there keep that game from being close. However, even with field goals and bad penalties, that game really felt like Michigan was in control most of it. The first quarter was odd, but i felt that Michigan was going to do what it wanted to do, and northwestern was not going to be able to stop them.
September 30th, 2018 at 8:15 AM ^
Is there a way to total up the penalty yards NW was awarded on offense + the yards our offense WOULD have had certain egregious penalties not be called? Not sure if those spots are recorded other than just eyeballing the tape.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:26 PM ^
It seems to me that the point of this thread was to discuss the obvious issues of reffing. I'm getting sick of the apologetic behavior that some people have here regarding the absolutely atrocious reffing in this league. It doesn't matter if the team plays bad or good, the reffing is a fucking problem.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:41 PM ^
It's very strange. We can't get through a single game without a few horrible calls or an obvious non-call.
We need Alex Jones to investigate.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:43 PM ^
Alex Jones type conspiracies only sports though. Someone make it happen.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:44 PM ^
Alex did investigate. He discovered that the problem can be solved by a rectal vitamin supplement. He happens to sell those on his website
September 29th, 2018 at 11:07 PM ^
Best taken with his bottled water that turns frogs gay.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:12 PM ^
Someone needs to turn the refs gay - maybe then we could get some love.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:43 PM ^
On the bright side, we didnt get any targeting penalties this game. Its progress!
September 30th, 2018 at 1:55 AM ^
I hear he is very busy investigating the pedophile government.
September 30th, 2018 at 7:48 AM ^
Not Alex Jones.
Peter Strzok.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:41 PM ^
I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but...
you're a conspiracy theorist.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:09 PM ^
I'm not saying it's aliens but...
IT'S ALIENS!!!
September 30th, 2018 at 5:56 PM ^
That explains the Higdon holding penalty from Mars then.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:42 PM ^
I am sure fans of any team feel the same way...but I'll be damned if it doesn't seem like there are so many bad/missed calls every game.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:06 PM ^
Syracuse got hosed by the refs today. We need to get back into the top 5 or 10 so the refs will start protecting us like they did for Clemson.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:08 PM ^
I live near Clemson and have two sons there, so I see a lot of Clemson games. Week after week, their opponent gets completely jobbed at a critical moment, usually toward the end of the game. Think the Texas A&M touchback -- that stuff happens for Clemson all the time. But they never receive a gratuitous penalty.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:43 PM ^
I don't hate this topic, but I'm a total homer and confirmation bias is a helluva drug.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:04 PM ^
Man, f*ck yo couch
September 29th, 2018 at 10:44 PM ^
Anyone who was there know what the sideline warning was for? It was like 2 plays in and wasn't on the TV.
September 29th, 2018 at 11:27 PM ^
As far as I can tell, our defensive players started walking onto the field about nano second before the official blew the punt return play dead.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:44 PM ^
The term conspiracy theorist was created to belittle anyone who questioned the story that LHO killed JFK solo. We now know that is bunk.
Back to the story - yes the Big 10 is deliberately targeting Harbaugh. 4.5 years straight is not a coincidenace.
September 29th, 2018 at 10:48 PM ^
Good hope he steps up his game!
Is Bryant coming next year?
September 29th, 2018 at 11:09 PM ^
Then what is it about high character guys who run clean programs that the B1G hates so much?
September 29th, 2018 at 11:37 PM ^
Makes the rest of the league look bad?