Last night, the NFL blew a call on the muff of a punt by the Seahawks. The league admitted the mistake.
On Friday, 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan was asked whether he received an apology from the league office.
“No,” Shanahan told reporters. “You don’t get any apologies, but apologies aren’t that big of a deal. Once it happens, you’ve got to move on with your life. Apologies don’t make it better. I’m just glad that it all worked out and just move on.”
The league’s transparency is refreshing. It helps that the 49ers still won, and covered the spread.
As explained by the NFL, the key angle from the Amazon Prime game production did not arrive until after the replay process resulted in a ruling that the ball had not touched Seahawks punt returner Dee Williams. It should have been San Francisco’s ball, because the angle that showed up too late showed the ball touching Williams’s finger.
Of course, it’s easy for the league to admit the mistake when, in the same breath, it blames a broadcast partner for it. The deeper question is whether the league should be relying on the network televising the game — or whether the league should have its own array of cameras.
In Week 1, NBC found the key shot of Ravens tight end Isaiah Likely’s toe clearly and obviously on the white line at the back of the end zone, wiping out what could have been (with the two-point try) a game-winning touchdown at Kansas City on opening night. If that game had been within the cluster of 1:00 p.m. ET games on Sunday afternoon, fewer cameras would have been deployed by the network; that fact alone might have changed the outcome of the game.
The league should have static cameras that blanket the field in every stadium. People like Bill Belichick have argued for it, for years. The only apparent reason for not doing it is, frankly, an unwillingness to spend the money.
If the Seahawks had won last night’s game — or if they had covered the spread — after the missed muff, there would be plenty of pressure for the NFL to peel off some of the cash flowing into the coffers from gambling sponsorships and finally do what should have been done years ago.