Controversial call leads to 13-10 loss for Ravens
Somehow, the Ravens got burned by the officials two times on the same play, and it might have cost them the game.
A phantom roughing the passer penalty on a play that never should have taken place gave the Tennessee Titans new life with under six minutes left, and they capitalized. Kerry Collins connected with Alge Crumpler on an 11 yard touchdown, giving the Titans a 13-10 lead that they did not relinquish.
On a 3rd and 10 from their own 20, trailing 10-6, a flag was thrown on the Titans for a false start. Normally, the play would be blown dead, but the officials allowed it to continue. Collins' pass fell incomplete, but another flag was thrown.
The referee claimed that Terrell Suggs had hit Collins in the head when he attempted to get a hand on the ball, although it looked clear on replays that Suggs hit the quarterback's shoulder. The 15 yard penalty negated the five yard false start, and gave the Titans a first down when they should have been walking to the sidelines.
"I think from the way the game was going, I think the referee just wanted to feel important," Suggs said after the game. "If anybody can go back, show me something I did illegal, then I would be happy to oblige and say 'I messed up and I got what I deserved -- a personal foul.' But when you are nowhere near his head -- we hit arms, we hit arms."
Head coach John Harbaugh had much less to offer on the personal foul, merely saying, "I can't comment on those kinds of things."
The other issue is why the play was allowed to continue after the false start was detected.
Referee Bill Carollo was asked why the play wasn't blown dead right off the bat.
"We tried to shut it down and blow the whistle," Carollo said. "But the players didn't hear the whistle, and they continued the play. 55 [Suggs] came in and hit the quarterback on the side of the helmet. If it had been anything other than a personal foul, we would have disregarded a hold or anything else."
"We're blowing the whistle, blowing the whistle. He may not have heard that -- and we're going to give him that -- but he still can't hit the quarterback on the helmet."
The play gave the Titans new life, and the Crumpler TD put them on top with under two minutes left. Any legitimate chance the Ravens had at tying the game or taking the lead ended when Flacco was picked off by Nick Harper.
It was Flacco's second interception of the game, with both coming when the rookie moved out of the pocket and tried to force a pass into traffic.
"I should've known to just get rid of the ball, and I just didn't use good judgement on those plays," Flacco said. "I'll obviously learn from that and we have to move on and get ready for next week.
"We let two games the last two weeks get away from us, and eventually, we're going to have to find a way to win these games," he said.
The call on Suggs was a referee judgement call, Suggs should have never been by the quaterback's head, on the same token, I think the referees should have ran into the line and stop the play if the offense had a false start instead of sitting back and just blowing the whistle. Do you know how loud that stadium is?
Now that Flacco has started the season, I think the Ravens will stick with him unless he gets injured. It's too bad because he really could have used the time to watch and learn NFL football. Some things come to light when you sit back and watch. Right now, the only difference between him and Kyle Boller, is that he doesn't trip over his feet,run and drop the ball, or throw the football like a shot put. It's a shame because the defense is playing lights out despite a couple of penalty blunders at critical times in the last 2 games.
Ealier Haynesworth jumps offsides and body slams Flacco and all they get out of it is a 5 yard encroachment penalty. That was ten times worse than what Suggs did. The Ravens did score on that drive, but it just goes to show what a BS call that was against Suggs.
bs ... the replay I have on TiVo has the 1st audio sound of a whistle occuring as the ball hits the ground 30 yds down field .. about 5 seconds late. Officials blew that part of the play.