i think you should just focus on the red raiders for the rest of the year. sec can be rough sometimes. :wink:
exactly ZERO volunteer players made an attempt at a recovery. saw the replay this morning again. there is an official about 10 yds from the ball, staring at it the entire time. dude never blew the play dead until bama recovered it. the ball had already rolled to a complete stop. to me, that means it was still alive, and UT could have advanced it. Tennessee should have at least made an attempt at recovering and advancing that ball. worst that could have happened was the official to decide it was not a live ball, and the game is over. But someone should have at least given it a shot.
Every coach I ever had would have torn players a new bunghole for not even trying to recover that ball, whether it was a live ball or not. Ball on the ground = hustle and recover every time. I watched it numerous times too and player were running away from the ball on the ground. It was live becasue as you said, the refs were watching it and the whistle didn't come until long after the block when one of the Bama LB's finally recovered it and it was blown dead.
The best part of all this is the gumps whining and crying about Danielson taking away a moment of "Alabama folklore". How hilarious that Danielson marginalized it with his comments. He was wrong but its still funny. EDIT: BTW...Danielson is on Finebaum right now and admits he was wrong. Said he made a mistake and after talking to SEC office even if Tenn had recovered the game was still over. These celebration penalties are dead ball fouls even if they occur in live play but never result in a replayed down.
Of course you still have to like at the 15, 16 second range where cody has his helmet off and the official is pointing the location of the ball to the bammer players.... [MEDIA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5El03CbLam0[/MEDIA]
Its all a moot point Deceks. Flag or no flag the game would have been over no matter who picked up that ball. Bammer lucked up by blocking 2 field goals and escaped an embarrassing loss. Kiffin beating Saban would have been a Hiroshima style nuclear meltdown. We'll just give em that melt down in about 12 days. Stay tuned!
Moot or not, it has been a very bad year for officials. Coaches are willing to face sanctions for complaining. That doesn't happen because of isolated random "mistakes".
They didn't have a chance. The ref was directing the 'bama players to the ball. Watch the ref. He did pull anything from his pocket. He was clearly telling the 'bama player to cover the ball. [MEDIA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5El03CbLam0[/MEDIA]