The Battle of Nevermore: Patriots vs. the Ravens (MNF)

[Basketball Jesus]

With the way people have been talking this week, you

[TheSheriff]

Look for the Patriots to come with a chip on their shoulders. Last week was exactly what the Pats needed, a close call against a lousy team. It showed the players that they haven't won a thing yet, and cannot just coast to an undefeated season and a Superbowl victory.

[Dirty Water]

Nice Zeppelin reference in the thread title.

[Bleeding Green]

Zeppelin via Poe.

[alwayslovetheceltics]

man, i know we are the best team in the nfl, but ray lewis still scares the hell out of me.

bbj, one man you didn't specifically note is ngata. this man is an absolute beast. will mankins lined up against him or kelly gregg- either matchup will be something to watch.

one thing to note is how physical the refs allows it to get with the receivers. last week, the refs lot of ish go between both teams (inexplicably though, they let everything go except for that ticky tack call on moss). I don't expect the refs to be so lenient every week. if the ravens try to copy cat the strategy, (the holding and the continous physical play on moss) they may be caught.

[Basketball Jesus]

Ugh, what an ugly, ugly win last night. I knew the Pats were going to have trouble moving the ball against the second-best defense in the NFL but not being able to stop their offense? Egad. Some thoughts:

- Willis McGahee isn

[threrf23]

Did the officiating suck? I couldn't tell on a few calls since ESPN didn't show replays. If there were holding non-calls that benefitted the Pats (or the Ravens), again they weren't shown by ESPN as far as I could tell. Ravens had more penalties, but were extremely agressive so thats not unforeseen, and I didn't witness any non-calls in the Pats favor.

Gaffney's TD catch was definatelty a legit reception. It looked pretty obvious to me. Apparently one Baltimore columnist who attacked the league's integrity based on the officiating disagrees. Credit to the idiots at ESPN who decided to go on and on about why it was a very questionable call for making such an argument sound credible.

http://www.ravens24x7.com/column_view.p ... ew=archive

I love how people will now be criticizing the Pats' efforts as
looking back to that call to attack the Pats' perfect season while they don't give two craps about the fact that the Browns lost to the Cardinals on Sunday due to a very bad call at the end of the game (Winslow quite obviously would have landed inbounds if not pushed out - of course it may have been hard to make such a call in real time in that situation, thats the league's fault for not making the call overturnable via replay).

The only truly incorrect call I have seen pointed out from the Pats/Ravens was the timeout which should not have been granted to the Ravens (because the def coordinator was not a head coach). But the Ravens wanted the timeout granted before the snap, so they only got their wish.

Anyways, was Kyle Boller that good last night, or was our secondary that bad?

[Datruth345]

every penalty was legit, and the gaffney catch, was in fact a catch

i don't understand how this is controversial

yeah, it was wild, crazy, emotional roller coaster, ultimately ridiculous ending

but controversial?... no kill all that

[milehigh]

I don't like the Patriots but there was nothing wrong with the officiating, if this was any other team in the league not named the Patriots nobody would of cared.

[alwayslovetheceltics]

one thing with the officiating. when did the league pass "its ok to hold randy moss even after 5 yards" rule?

did I miss that?

he got mugged by mcCalister and Reed all night.

also, we got beat at the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball. very rare that happens. with the number 3 pick, pats select dorsey. damn right bitches. problem solved in the future.

[threrf23]

more BS...

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football ... 0234_x.htm