And I would say that even if he were not bashing Texas officiating
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/yb/153191653Sometimes being biased worse than being bad in refs
By Edward Carifio, The Sun, Yuma, Ariz.
Dec. 07--Incompetence vs. bias.
Both are bad in referees. But which is worse? After Saturday's 31-27 loss to Blinn in the Heart of Texas Bowl, I would wager AWC players, coaches and officials would say bias.
As required by law, here's the setup. Arizona Western is losing in Copperas Cove, Texas, to the Buccaneers, who are from Brenham, about two and a half hours away. They close the gap to 31-27 after a touchdown. The Blinn returner fumbles the ball and AWC's Nathan Mayfield emerges from the bottom of the pile with the ball, seemingly setting up the Matadors on the Blinn 20.
Except the referee ruled that the returner was down before the ball came loose. Blinn ball. The Bucs go on to run out enough clock for the win.
Now, that's just one call. And normally, I would just shrug that off. Calls like that happen. You have to expect bad calls on the road -- and with a central Texas crew officiating the game, make no mistake about it. This was a road game.
But what makes this really, to borrow a phrase from the great Peter Griffin, grind my gears is that the same play happened earlier in the game. Well, almost.
On a kick return after Blinn went ahead 10-0 late in the first quarter, Brock Ringo fumbled the football after a big return, although from the press box it was pretty clear the ground caused the fumble. But he was ruled in play, and Blinn took over on their 45. Four plays later they had a 17-0 lead.
Both plays happened on the side of the field closest to my vantage point, which was along the Matador sideline. Both looked like they could -- dare I say should -- have gone AWC's way. Obviously, the Matadors feel like they got robbed. And Blinn coach Brad Franchione was noncommittal on commenting on the plays after the game. Of course, he didn't have a very good vantage point on the far side of the field. Besides, what's he going to say? "Yeah, we got lucky there. I'm going to go ahead and give AWC this trophy." I don't think so.
There were some other calls that seemed iffy. But there was a ton of penalties on both teams, and it's not like the Matadors were strangers to the color yellow. At least early in the season. But it was those two plays that stood out, to me anyway, as contradictory and even suspicious.
But, like AWC running back Reggie Bullock said after the game, that's just Texas. As someone who spent three years in the Lone Star State, I learned two things. One is that there is no city like Austin. But more importantly, Texas officiating crews are generally biased.
That means the home team is going to get all the calls, whether it's Salado playing at Troy in a 2A battle, a Dallas team playing one from the suburbs in a 5A clash or AWC playing Blinn at the junior college level.
At least incompetence knows no bias. If a ref thinks there are three downs and not four or it's 20 yards to a first down, at least that will be applied both teams equally. If it's applied equally, then incompetence in an officiating isn't really a hurdle.
But if you have a Texas crew working a Texas game against an out-of-state team, pride is going to take over. Maybe at a subconscious level, but it will happen.
As AWC coach Tom Minnick said Saturday after the loss, maybe next year's bowl game, hosted by Arizona Western and the Caballeros de Yuma, will have Arizona officials so he can finally get a call.
Or a the very least, maybe they'll think a touchdown is worth four points. You know, be incompetent but neutral. Then we can get a better gauge of who the best team is.
Edward Carifio can be reached at ecarifio@yumasun.com or 539-6882
