December 26th, 2009 
Mike 
Posted in 
Upon further review: Ed Hochuli’s crew allowed too much chippy play. Jackson’s helmet came off at least 4 times today; how does that happen without a penalty? Jacques Reeves’ facemask on Amendola’s long return seemed pretty cut-and-dried but the officials had to hold a conclave before confirming the flag. Pollard threw the first punch of the fight with Jackson and knocked his helmet off. Not only should he have gotten the only flag on the play, he should have been ejected. I was afraid Jackson could also get ejected; at least Hochuli didn’t do that, making the useless offsetting personal foul call instead. After the fight, the ball was spotted a yard short, two yards from the marker, though Hochuli announced it was 3rd-and-1. The radio crew pointed out several more missed spots by the crew today as well. They didn’t appear to affect the game, but it wasn’t a stellar outing for the zebras, either. C-minus.
Cheers: Just over 46,000 tickets were sold for today’s game. I’ll assume half the people who bought tickets actually attended. The crowd was small and not very noisy, though I’d like to think crowd reaction to the replay on the big screen helped convince Hochuli on the face mask penalty during Amendola’s long kick return. Part of the halftime show was a video tribute to Merlin Olsen, in an especially nice touch, narrated by Dick Enberg. I thought the ceremony meant Olsen would get a banner in the rafters like Deacon and Marshall, but I guess he has to settle for his retired number and the Ring of Honor for now. Which he already had. Speaking of numbers, the new QB Reilly is wearing #13. Why haven’t the Rams put that number on hold? Lastly, Tampa Bay 24, Seattle 7, huh? Half of me is mad Seattle lays an egg to the Bucs but can still beat the Rams for the ninth and tenth straight times this year. The other half would like to extend a friendly St. Louis welcome to Ndamukong Suh. The Rams are on the clock!
