News: ESPN: How the Dez Bryant no-catch call changed the NFL forever

[rags747]

Great article. 4th down in Green Bay and Romo launches it perfectly for the win. What could have been, that was our year!

 

[stuckindc]

The play being ruled a catch doesn't guarantee they win though. I believe he caught at and dove to the one. Let's say they run it in for the score, we still have to give the ball back to Aaron Rodgers. An Aaron Rodgers who had one leg and still managed not to barely get sacked. Add to that the defense couldnt get a needed stop after the failed 4th down. Also perhaps if butterfinger Demarco doesn't fumble he'd hit his head on the goal post making the Dez catch/non catch possibly not be a factor. Sure the ref made a bad call, especially by today's standards, but defense couldnt get a one legged Rodgers on the ground at all, Murray fumbled a clear huge gain and most likely TD. That's why the cowboys lost.


The same thing can be said for what happened the prior week when they played Detroit. The ref screwed up /picked up the flag on pass interference. What Detroit fans seem to forget is the punter shanking a kick for 6yards or so giving the Cowboys great field position right after that. That always gets left out.

We’ll said

 

[stuckindc]

I much rather lose and have a chance than to have it taken away from you.

That is why this one stings more than the playoff loss at home. We had them pinned and Rodgers to Cook made a hell of a play. I still cannot believe Byron Jones let that happen

Also great point Would have been nice to see the final minutes play out.

 

[fivetwos]

My first thoughts as the play was taking place…

WHY is Romo throwing a low percentage bomb on 4th and 1 with 4 minutes plus left?

I saw it hit the ground in real time but chose denial. The one and only time I broke something of value at the result.

Afterward….didn’t matter. The Dallas defense couldn’t stop gimpy Rodgers after the turnover. Why would it have been any different after a kickoff needing only a Crosby FG?

If you want to get fired up, rewatch the game and tell me the Murray miracle fumble wasn’t a much bigger play.

 

[DripTooHard]

I much rather lose and have a chance than to have it taken away from you.

That is why this one stings more than the playoff loss at home. We had them pinned and Rodgers to Cook made a hell of a play. I still cannot believe Byron Jones let that happen

Byron Jones was dead to me after that play. He should have been shipped out of town immediately. No way you let that happen.

 

[Tenkamenin]

Even if that pass to Dez was ruled a catch, I'm sure Rogers would have found a way to win the game................LOL!!!

By the rules at the time, it wasn't a catch.
But I don't think it mattered anyway.
If it was ruled a touchdown, we would have been up by (2) 28-26 or by three (3) 29-26.
But we weren't stopping Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay. With 4 minutes left, he likely would have driven down the field for the winning touchdown.

I knew that game, if that TD counted Aaron would’ve folded.

 

[ghst187]

I never understood how it wasnt a catch for several reasons…
he VERY clearly controlled the ball and took THREE steps after the catch and made a football move. Secondly, I’m not even sure the football even ever touched the ground. Easily one of the most ridiculous calls of all time. That said, I’m sure AR would’ve gone down and scored.
Where that game was really lost was when Demarco had a clear path to the end zone and Julius Peppers poked the ball out from behind. That to me was the point where the game was lost.

 

[Mannix]

I wholeheartedly believe that if that were Jordy Nelson or Davante Adams, they would not have overturned the call.

I wholeheartedly believe that had Dean Blandino not been caught partying in the Jones " Wh*** Bus" earlier that season, he would have felt ZERO pressure to be any part of reversing that call...I mean "catch"

 

[FVSTONE]

You don’t know that! And you never will because the NFL robbed us of a great finish!

Rogers always elevates his game against the Boys.............

 

[tyke1doe]

Stop talking like this is a fact. It’s not.

Of course, it's not, silly. We're talking mere speculation or what we think would have likely happened. I thought that was understood.

We may have lost the game in the end. If we won we may have lost the next week. That’s not the point.

The point is we never got the chance due to that horrible call reversal.

It was the right call according to the rules at the time. I didn't like it anymore than the next Cowboy fan. But it was the right call.
And all the wishing it was different won't change that.

Now, THAT, I know as fact.

 

[tyke1doe]

I knew that game, if that TD counted Aaron would’ve folded.

Yeah, that hobbled Aaron Rogers sure was impaired wasn't he? Amazing what a one-legged man can do when he wants to win.

 

[Typhus]

It will be interesting to see if the refs call a straight game this time. They'll likely make calls to keep the game from being a blowout if needed but I don't think the league is full on trying to keep the Packers in the playoff race, that ship may have sailed. It's all about ratings...

I just hope Parsons groin has healed enough so that he can drag 320lb OL as they strangle hold him.

 

[CWR]

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/34997228/how-dez-bryant-no-catch-changed-nfl-forever

WE ALL SAW IT. It happened right before our very eyes.

Fifty-two point three million of us watched it live on television. Untold millions have watched it since, in its YouTube afterlife. And to watch it once is to watch it many times, almost by definition -- nobody even had the chance to watch it just once, since the replays started rolling as soon as the ball was whistled dead. The play itself took about seven seconds, snap to signal. The ensuing deliberation took another four minutes, give or take, and the controversy the play generated has lasted for nearly eight years and counting.

It was a catch, of course. It was ruled a catch on the field at 3:58:43 p.m. on Jan. 11, 2015, and it remained a catch until 4:02:29, when the referee announced the reversal by the letter of the law. Then three years later, it became a catch again, when the NFL changed the rules to accommodate its brilliance. Now every time we watch an NFL game we witness some aspect of its legacy, because one of the greatest catches in the history of the game was ruled, "after review," incomplete.

There have been other catches that have, in the space of a few seconds, caused football empires to rise and fall. Bradshaw-Swann, 1976; Montana-Clark, 1982; Manning-Tyree, 2008; Roethlisberger-Holmes, 2009; Brady-Edelman 2017: these are catches that have changed games, careers, fortunes and lives. But they all counted. The pass that Tony Romo threw to Dez Bryant in a playoff game between the Dallas Cowboys and Green Bay Packers in 2015 -- or, in its enduring social media afterlife, #DezCaughtIt -- did not, and yet it has changed the way we watch football.

This Sunday's game between the Cowboys and Packers allows us yet again to think about a play that has changed our expectations and our perceptions, the leaps of imagination we once thought impossible and the rounds of on-field litigation we now accept as inevitable. It brought football into its modern era, when we can scarcely believe what we have just seen and then can expect to be told we have not seen it. There was a before and there was an after, and if we wonder why in 2022 we live in a time when nobody can agree on anything, when unlimited scrutiny and maximum technological expertise have combined to produce an age of endless uncertainty, all we have to do is watch, once again, these teams play in January 2015, and try to tell each other, what happens when Tony Romo throws the ball down the sideline and Dez Bryant goes up to get it.

The play was the play because the moment was the moment. It was a divisional playoff game. It was in Green Bay, on an afternoon that was 24 degrees at game time, and though the tundra remained unfrozen, it was a game with a Lombardi-era pedigree as well as high stakes for the outcome of the 2014 football season. Both teams had finished 12-4; the Packers, with an unjaded Aaron Rodgers at quarterback, were 6½-point favorites, but the Cowboys had gone unbeaten on the road, and at least three of their players, Tony Romo and Dez Bryant and DeMarco Murray, were having career years. Dallas had gone ahead by eight points midway through the third quarter, but Green Bay had scored two touchdowns and now Cowboys coach Jason Garrett's team faced the moment that would decide if this was their moment.

Thanks for the trip down misery lane. It was a good read nonetheless.

 

[mldardy]

My first thoughts as the play was taking place…

WHY is Romo throwing a low percentage bomb on 4th and 1 with 4 minutes plus left?

I saw it hit the ground in real time but chose denial. The one and only time I broke something of value at the result.

Afterward….didn’t matter. The Dallas defense couldn’t stop gimpy Rodgers after the turnover. Why would it have been any different after a kickoff needing only a Crosby FG?

If you want to get fired up, rewatch the game and tell me the Murray miracle fumble wasn’t a much bigger play.

Could have been. If that Dez catch is a TD or down at the 1 and we punch it in and then convert the 2 pt. conversion we go up 29-26. They need a TD to win at that point. I like our chances to hold them to a FG and it goes into OT or we get the ball back with a 40 seconds left drive down the field get in FG range and kick the game winner. We'll never know.

 

[gimmesix]

It will be interesting to see if the refs call a straight game this time. They'll likely make calls to keep the game from being a blowout if needed but I don't think the league is full on trying to keep the Packers in the playoff race, that ship may have sailed. It's all about ratings...

This officiating crew has been favorable to the home team, so I expect a couple of close calls or noncalls to go their way (maybe even not-so-close). Fortunately, this year we seem to have the team to overcome them ... so far.

 

[ElGatoGrande]

I just hope Parsons groin has healed enough so that he can drag 320lb OL as they strangle hold him.

I've been wondering if or when the refs plan on calling those holds, everyone is holding him with impunity. If they're going to give our OL a break on holding calls too I guess it's alright but it's not fair to Micah.

 

[The Quest for Six]

Dez taking 3 steps after he caught it wasn't enough? How many steps do you need?

falling down isn't a step

 

[CoachD]

Let me say this about this play........Bryant went 14 1/2 feet with the ball end of story.

 

[calico]

Tough game to relive. The cowboys left alot of meat on the bone out there in that game beyond that catch call. They just didn’t execute at crucial points and could never pull away from them.

 

[mattjames2010]

It shouldn't have taken until the Dez moment for the NFL to change on this - there were multiple plays on multiple teams that had this happen to them.

This is the issue with the NFL, they only start to give a crap when this stuff happens when the lights are the brightest and in the biggest moments.