The Seattle Seahawks had everything going for them at home against the Detroit Lions on Monday night. Up 13-3, the Legion of Boom was doing its thing against Matthew Stafford and the Lions offense.
Then, something odd happened. Facing pressure all game long, Russell Wilson coughed the ball up twice in the final stanza, one leading to a Lions touchdown to pull the game within 13-10. After Seattle failed to move the ball down the field on the ensuing possession, Detroit took over with the ball deep on its own end.
Stafford proceeded to lead the Lions down the field for a potential game-winning touchdown-scoring drive. With the ball inside Seattle's red zone, Stafford hit Calvin Johnson on a slant that looked like it was going for the go-ahead touchdown with less than two minutes remaining.
As you can see, Johnson fuimbled right before crossing into the end zone.
A conversation that started with praise for Kam Chancellor and criticism over Johnson holding the ball too loosely quickly turned into a conversation about the NFL rule book.
Check out the tail end of the video. Seahawks linebacker K.J. Wright looked to have purposely batted the ball out of bounds — an illegal move that would have given Detroit first and goal at the one with less than two minutes remaining and down by just three.
Here's the explanation of what happened from the NFL's Vice President of Officiating, Dean Blandino:
We'll review all the angles," Blandino said on Monday Night Football. "On TV it looked like the Seahawks player intentionally hit the ball. That is a foul. The result of the penalty would give Detroit possession enforced at the spot of the fumble. With half the distance to the goal line, Detroit would have had a first down."
That right there is the league admitting that a mistake was made by the officials on this particular play. Blandino went on to indicate that the play isn't reviewable, which is absolutely absurd considering it did result in a change of possession — which by definition is a reviewable play around the NFL. That's only magnified by the fact that the officials had to review the play to see whether Johnson actually crossed into the end zone.
Interestingly enough, Wright was pretty upfront about his intentions when batting the ball out of the end zone.
"I wanted to just knock it out of bounds and not try to catch it and fumble it," he said. " I was just trying to make a good play for my team," the linebacker said. "You can't hit it backwards, and you can't intentionally, I guess, knock it out. But at the time, I wasn't thinking that. I was just trying to not mess up the game. So I know now."
As it is, Seattle was given possession of the ball at the 20 on the touchback. A couple plays later, Wilson and Co. were seen in victory formation.
The result of this play and the larger outcome of the game is huge. If Seattle had lost, it would have headed to Cincinnati to take on an undefeated Bengals team with a 1-3 record and tied with the San Francisco 49ers in last place in the NFC West. Instead, the two-time defending NFC champions are just one game behind the Arizona Cardinals in the division.
Meanwhile, Detroit fell to 0-4 on the season. Since the AFL/NFL merger back in 1966, only one team has earned a trip to the postseason after losing four consecutive to start the year.
And while most will blame this non-call for playing a huge role in the outcome of the game, teams make their own breaks.
If Johnson had held on to the ball close to his body rather than treating it like a loaf of bread, we wouldn't be having this conversation. And it took a great play from Chancellor to jar it loose.
NFL rules might need to change moving forward, but there is a reason Detroit stands at 0-4 heading into Week 5. You simply can't make these mistakes and expect to win on a consistent basis in the NFL.