There were some awful calls in that game yesterday and someone in Dallas had to speak up because the worst calls went against the Cowboys. McCarthy has to protect his players.
The calls I thought were the worst were:
The second PI call on brown. That contact was no different than what we see all the time in the NFL. Plus, the ball was nowhere near the receiver. It was uncatchable.
The incomplete pass that should have been ruled a fumble and a Dallas recovery. Waller caught the ball in his hands and took 2 steps while turning upfield. By the rule it was a catch and a fumble. I have no idea if or when it was reviewed or why the officials looked at that play and called it incomplete. They whole thing looked hokey to me.
The roughing the pass call on Micah Parsons. Everything was wrong with this call. First, Carr was scrambling and out of the pocket. Second, he ran into Parsons. Parsons actually let up on hitting him. That was 15 big yards.
The last PI call on Anthony Brown. I posted the PI rule in another thread. The rules does not say a player not going to the ball is guilty of PI. He has to make contact, and in doing so it has to be intentional, not incidental. Incidental contact vitiates PI. But in this case, the ball was underthrown. Brown was in underneath position. He did not make any attempt to push, block, hold or otherwise impede the receiver. This was not PI but it gave the Raiders a 1st down instead of a 4th and 18. The Raiders probably would have punted the ball back to Dallas.
Finally, the play where Kelvin Joseph was ejected. I thought the replay clearly showed the Raiders player was the aggressor. I did not see Joseph do anything other than defend himself against the aggression of the Raiders player. I don;t know why either player was ejected, but I saw nothing that Joseph did to warrant an ejection.
I will add two non-calls. First, the hit on Pollard out of bounds. The way the refs were calling everything so tight, why did they not call that one? How was that play any different than the call on Parsons for roughing Carr? The other non-call was the PI not called on (I think it was) Noah Brown. It was the play before the play where Schultz went to the ground claiming he was interfered with. Again, what I saw was more contact than Anthony Brown had made on 2 earlier penalties and on the one he would get to end the game. But no call. If there is one thing that bugs me about refs it is when they are inconsistent.
Overall this game was one of the worst I have seen in the NFL as far as officiating is concerned. I am glad McCarthy called the league office. I am glad the media is making a lot of the calls too.