Outside of Steelers fans (and even some of them will admit it), everyone believes the officiating in SBXL was the worst in Super Bowl history. A current ESPN sportsnation poll has the poor officiating as the #1 most memorable story from Super Bowl XL.
Here are some opinions by national columnists:
[KC Star]: Jason Whitlock “A group of middle-aged executives trying to keep pace with a group of highly trained 20-something athletes destroyed America’s sports holiday.”
[WashPost]: Michael Wilbon “Seattle should have been ahead by a couple of touchdowns, yet found themselves down 7-3 at halftime because the referees blew a call.”
[FoxSports]: Kevin Hench “Every single questionable, marginal or outright bad call went against the Seahawks.”
[Patsfan.com] Bob George “Capping off a postseason littered with bad officials calls all over the place, it seemed only fitting that referee Bill Leavy and his crew apply the coup de grace in the biggest game of them all. Three bogus calls were what basically did the Seahawks in.”
[ESPN]: Skip Bayless “The first-quarter offensive pass interference called on Darrell Jackson that turned a touchdown into a field goal was robbery enough. But the fourth-quarter holding call on Sean Locklear made you wonder if the refs had even less of Aretha’s r-e-s-p-E-c-t for your Seahawks than I do.”
[ESPN]: Michael Smith “Here’s what referee Bill Leavy’s crew did, point blank: It robbed Seattle.”
[Rochester Democrat]: Bob Matthews “The Steelers may or may not have been the better team. They certainly got the best of the officiating.”
Here’s a petition to review NFL officiating.
