I had to contribute to conspiracy theories, and in this case I most certainly don't believe there was a conspiracy at work as has been suggested in discussions elsewhere on the interweb.

But I do have two observations.

First, if I can see a hold on my 19" television from home, then it's enough of a hold that it should be called. Pittsburgh got away with visible holds all night that Seattle couldn't to save their lives.

Second, as someone who has *covered* pass receivers and been pushed off on, I have to say that Seattle got badly robbed in the endzone. I don't know if giving them a touchdown they clearly earned would have changed the end results, but

Why do I think the refs were so friendly to Pittsburgh and not Seattle? As I said, I don't countenance talk of conspiracies. I believe the NFL officials may be the most honorable in all of professional sports. In recent years their vaunted reputation for skillful officiating has been badly tarnished, but even in this case I doubt it it comes down to poor performance.

Frankly, I think it's just because they're human, same as the rest of us. I think they caught a bit of the Pittsburgh fever -- the mystique, the history, the Bus! The Seahawks are just some upstart from latte land, but Pittsburgh, now THAT'S a football club. As a result, Seattle got called tight and Pittsburgh got called loose, and the end result is the integrity of this game was compromised on the field.

Would Seattle have won if the officiating had been more balanced? I don't know. They made plenty of boneheaded moves and very well may have lost anyway. But they also outplayed Pittsburgh up and down the field for most of the game. In the end, Pittsburgh won on two high-risk gadget plays and one broken play that could have gone either way. They may still have won, and those gadgets may still have worked, but when Randle El threw his pass, there was at least one hold going on that would have cost Seattle the play. I know, because I watched on my 19" television, and said to my wife, "Look at that -- another monster hold. How much you wanna bet it doesn't get called?"

Opening line of my previous letter should have read "I HATE to contribute..."

Doh!

Actually, the Steelers caught the break on the catch and fumble non-call. While it is true that the Pittsburgh linebacker had a clean shot at the ball before the refs whistled the ball dead, he would have recovered it somewhere around the ten or twelve yard line. Two plays later the Seahawks punted and Rouen put it in the end zone for the touchback. Net result of the non-call was first and ten at the twenty instead of the ten. An important net gain for the Steelers given that they had not been able to move the ball at all up to that point (and went three and out again after that).

The phantom TD could have gone either way, and the Jackson push-off also could and probably would have been overlooked except that the back judge was standing two feet away when it happened. But the holding call was a real back-breaker, and after watching the replay a dozen times I still can't see it. Too bad, because a Seahawks TD at that point would have made the game really exciting--which is all I cared about since I had zero rooting interest in it.

So, this isn't about the game per se. The fisrt half was a crashing bore. The second half was sloppy and so forth.

I want to talk about that pre-game thing where ABC claimed to recognize the MVPs from 'all' the previous games.

What exactly happened to Games XIII amd XIV?

In other words: where was Terry Bradshaw? He's got 4 rings. Passed for over 300 yards in both games. 4 TDs in XIV.

He isn't mentioned. He isn't shown except for a nanosecond in a movie trailer. It's like he's been written out of history?

What exactly hell is this about, huh?

Oh, that was just so classy, such a demonstration of 'sportmanship, the way the Steelers fans loudly booed every Dallas and 49ers MVP as they were presented - including all time greats like Roger Staubach and Joe Montana. As though any person on either team in XL had anyone of this caliber.

Punting: Good point, I shouldn't have said the Seahawks gave up 60 yards. It was as many as 57. But I stand by the statement that those touchbacks hurt them badly.

Pylon: The pylon is in bounds, but it's not the ground. The rules explicitly state that a receiver must touch both feet to the ground inbounds for it to be a catch, provided it's not a force out.

To wit: "A forward pass is complete when a receiver clearly possesses the pass and touches the ground with both feet inbounds while in possession of the ball."

Interference: I'm totally mystified by all objections to this call other than that of Michael Irvin, who thinks WRs should be able to do anything. If I were going to look for film of a textbook case of offensive pass interference, I would look no further than this play. Where did this idea come from that the defender has to be knocked down for it to be interference? Does the receiver have to be knocked down? You know how hard it is to knock an athlete down by pushing with one arm? Anyway, here's the rule:

It is pass interference by either team when any player movement beyond the offensive line **significantly hinders the progress of an eligible player or such player's opportunity to catch the ball.** (Emphasis added.)

And:

Actions that constitute offensive pass interference include but are not limited to:

... (b) Initiating contact with a defender by shoving or pushing off thus creating a separation in an attempt to catch a pass.

The rule on what's a reception isn't really that complicated. If you're standing on one foot in the endzone, catch the ball, hop on one foot out of the endzone, and put the second foot down out of play, it's not a catch. You need to have two feet (or the equivalent) down in the field of play to have a catch. You may like the college rules better, but they're not used in the NFL. Get over it.

As for the holding play, the Seattle player clearly had his arm wrapped underneath the Steeler player's arm and shoulder pad. The only problem I have with a call like that is that, as Madden pointed out, something that could technically be called holding does happen on every play, so naturally people will complain when a less blatant hold gets called. Maybe the NFL should adopt the NHL's approach and demand zero tolerence from officials for anything that looks remotely like holding and hope that the players adjust eventually.

Somehow I don't think this is ever going to happen, mostly because more holding penalties in hockey leads to more power plays and more scoring, while more holding penalties in football means moving the offense backwards and slowing down the game. And eliminating everything that's technically illegal would result in games with 10 times as many sacks as points scored.