Horrifically Bad UR Call

[theaardvark]

Holm was trying for the catch. and there was no helmet contact... complete bogus call mistake.

[blue_or_die]

Clear as day no head contact. Knew that the first time I saw it, and confirmed by replay. Make up call for the ?turf catch? earlier by the CGY receiver which was ruled dead but was a catch.

[pdirks67]

I thought it was a brutal call live, and an even worse call after the replay.

I am very "pro-get-the-call-right" and I believe the CFL refs are much, much better than they were a few years ago. But this was a totally botched call.

When I was at the "you make the call" session a few weeks ago with the CFL VP of Officiating, he was very clear that simply contacting the head is not a penalty. It has to be a "strike". Mind you, that was in the context of roughing-the-passer. I don't believe that Holm made any contact with the head of the receiver, but if there happened to be some glancing touch, it should not have been a penalty any way.

[dd]

The player was in a vulnerable position and couldn?t defend himself and the glancing blow was in the neck area-Begeltons head looked like a bobble head, and in the era of increased player safety involving the head and neck area, as per the rule, this type of hit should get called every time.

The thing that bothers me is the exact same thing happened to collaros a week ago and no call, and he?s now out of action. They need to be consistent with head and neck area shots and when it?s close, error on the safe side and call it. The game has got to reduce head injuries as much as possible as there are waaaaay too many in the game and they carry a huge consequence to players long term health

[TecnoGenius]

FWIW, I did not see any contact with the Cal receivers head at all, should have been a non call. Holmes let up in my opinion, can you imagine if the Cal receiver caught that, Holmes would have lit him up, they probably would have had to cart him off the field.

Holm not only let up, he wasn't even going for any hit at all.  Watch the slow-mo replay from the side that has Biggie in the foreground.  Do nothing but watch Holm's eyes.  He's tracking the ball like a WR all the way, putting his arms in just the right place.

Once the ball passes, watch Begelton... he runs into Holm, not the other way around!!  How on earth can you take a UR for just occupying your space while both are running for the ball?

Horseman is right: if Holm was going for the hit / catch disruption he would have creamed Begelton like we used to watch Loffler do to everyone.

[dd]

Doesn?t matter if he meant to hit him or not, the glancing contact hit begeltons neck area, by rule definition call it. But in the same breath, call collaros s hit as well. In both cases there was no intent to hit the head or neck area but they did, so call it and be consistent

[TecnoGenius]

Watch the replay again. Not the one from the end zone camera, which doesn't show it. Holm's shoulder contacted the receiver helmet/chin.

But it didn't.  I thought maybe there was a brush of Holm's uniform by Begel's helmet, but I'm not even sure there's proof of that.  I'm pretty sure I have video tech here far in advance of whatever you're using (not bragging, just a function of my nerdiness).  If you think there's a clear shoulder to head hit, you tell me precisely which replay and moment it occurs.

Watching this more, and thinking back to the previous year Begelton spinning-in-the-air UR (that also wasn't UR), I'm starting to conclude that this is something Begelton does... in these situations if a hit comes in he tries to make sure both feet come off the ground and he makes his body 100% limp.

Watch the moment when he contact Holm.  He goes completely limp and not from a concussion or anything, it's just what he does.  As a result any contact makes him appear to spin or ragdoll in what looks like an egregious hit (UR).  But it's not.  It's the same type of hit every other receiver takes all game long.  But Begel hams it up every time.  And then he makes sure he lays on the turf to really sell it (Cody School Of Writhing grad).  Every time.

It's weird that when he actually makes the catches, none of these things occurs.  But when he whiffs he pulls out this stunt.  Watch the whole thing again and ignore the fake reaction and just look at the hit: it's a nothingburger hit that every WR gets every time (see some ones Kenny takes, or Bailey?) and none of them react this way.

It's actually a very smart play (if "wimpy" and cowardly): if refs are going to call these then we should ragdoll and writhe too, every time.  Free 15 yards and drive extension on 3rd down.  It'll start looking like soccer.

If Begelton was so roughed up, how come he's perfectly back to normal on the very next snap running at full speed on another route??

[TecnoGenius]

At the game live it looked like begelton ran into our guy and I was expecting an OPI call.  Was pissed when it was some bogus UR call.  My cousin (stamps fan) was like that was clearly a blindside hit .... so I guess we see different things.

That's what I thought too when I saw it live!  I'm like "flag for what"?  Then thought, maybe OPI because Holm probably had a better shot at the ball, AND it was Begelton that ran into Holm!!

There's no blindside hit rule on a WR vs DB play pre-catch.  You can hit him from any direction you want.

[bunker]

Holmes not only let up, he wasn't even going for any hit at all.  Watch the slow-mo replay from the side that has Biggie in the foreground.  Do nothing but watch Holm's eyes.  He's tracking the ball like a WR all the way, putting his arms in just the right place.

Once the ball passes, watch Begelton... he runs into Holms, not the other way around!!  How on earth can you take a UR for just occupying your space while both are running for the ball?

Horseman is right: if Holmes was going for the hit / catch disruption he would have creamed Begelton like we used to watch Loffler do to everyone.

Agree

[TecnoGenius]

I can totally see why they threw the flag. It looked bad. Even one of the TSN replay angles looked bad.

Therein lies the problem.  It looked bad.  They are judging these based on looks (i.e. results), and that leaves too much room for embellishing.  I think Begelton is the master embellisher.  I've seen his stunt too many times before.

[dd]

His head was ragdolling about and if he?s embellishing it, that?s rough for the refs to call as football isn?t soccer where the players fake so many injuries it is both ridiculous and an embarrassment.

I d love to see him draw an oc penalty for his faking

[TecnoGenius]

Doesn?t matter if he meant to hit him or not, the glancing contact hit begeltons neck area, by rule definition call it. But in the same breath, call collaros s hit as well. In both cases there was no intent to hit the head or neck area but they did, so call it and be consistent

Oh so now we drop the "helmet hit" requirement down to mere "neck area"?  Remember, this isn't RTP, this is a WR and they don't get as much protection.

Art 4 (g) Delivering a blow to an opponent in the neck or head.

There was no "blow" to his neck.  At worst he glanced it, but I don't even think that happened.  It looked like he took the initial hit to the upper chest pads / collarbone area.  That's it.

in any event, there was no blow to either head or neck.  Blow implies a strike or the first/major point of contact.  That did not occur.

Do you guys see what kind of hits to the head Brady takes on every run?  Even Bailey and Lawler as receivers were taking hits worse than this.  It's just that Begelton sold it better.  It looked worse.  Because our guys aren't soccer players.

[TecnoGenius]

His head was ragdolling about and if he?s embellishing it, that?s rough for the refs to call as football isn?t soccer where the players fake so many injuries it is both ridiculous and an embarrassment.

I d love to see him draw an oc penalty for his faking

Actually his head barely moved in this instance.  It's his body that flies around in spins like a rag doll.  This is at least the 3rd time I've seen this from him.  No other player does that.

He may have stumbled upon the perfect can't-make-the-catch ploy that draws UR, and it might have the added benefit of protecting himself from injury.  When the hit is coming, jump off the turf and make everything go limp.  It looks really bad and the refs give you a UR, and you don't get hurt. The first few times I thought he was taking bad hits, but now I think we'll get wise to his tricks.  Why doesn't this seem to happen to other WRs??

If you don't believe a player can "go limp", think back to all the Andrew Harris pressers, once in a while he'd tell us about his secrets to not get injured.  He explicitly said he has pre-planned situations where he goes limp vs tensing up, vs other tricks.  Proof that players can make themselves limp to further their goals.  AH33 didn't do it to draw flags though, he did it to preserve his body in the most punishing CFL position.

[TecnoGenius]

I'm watching the 1st Q of the MTL@OTT game and basically every other reception is taking a hit worse than the Holm UR hit.  Arms and shoulders to the head all over the place.  Head-on massive collisions.  Some while another D guy is hanging on to them.  Yet no flags for UR.  Weird 

The only difference is the WRs don't let their bodies go limp, and they don't writhe like a soccer player.  They jump up and keep going because they don't want to appear weak.  It is becoming clearer to me that the refs are looking more at the result (spinning, writhing) than the hit itself.

We need to talk more how Begelton appears to be faking it on every non-catch hit.  He needs to be called out for this.  If he's feigning concussion-type goes-limp symptoms, then why isn't the spotter taking him out?  Why doesn't he come out on his own?  This Holm hit takes the cake because he literally was barely touched.  Nothing head on.  Only glancing.  No head hit.  Like I said, it's less of a hit than 50% of the hits in the OTT game.

Strange how he doesn't seem to ever have any issues like this when he gets completions, even with worse hits. 

I'm watching Begelton like a hawk the rest of the season.  The funny thing is he's a great receiver and seems like a genuinely nice guy otherwise.  But he gets injured a lot and has never regained his 2019 form for whatever reason.  He'd actually make a good Bomber (minus the antics).

[Sir Blue and Gold]

Therein lies the problem.  It looked bad.  They are judging these based on looks (i.e. results), and that leaves too much room for embellishing.  I think Begelton is the master embellisher.  I've seen his stunt too many times before.

Obviously the refs call a play on how it looks. It looked bad. The refs get zero replays. We got a whole bunch and slow motion.