The Baltimore Ravens and San Francisco 49ers all the time felt like a doable Tremendous Bowl preview because the group’s ready to face off on Christmas Day to cap Week 16. Baltimore entered the sport because the No. 1 seed within the AFC, whereas San Francisco entered as the highest seed within the NFC. It was additionally a showdown of two MVP favorites with quarterbacks Lamar Jackson and Brock Purdy.
For such a marquee matchup, the scoring in Baltimore-San Francisco positive began within the strangest approach doable.
The Niners scored two factors on a security when Jackson scrambled again 20 yards and appeared to journey on a stumbling referee ultimately zone. Jackson was known as for intentional grounding, which resulted within the security. Watch the play right here:
Right here’s an alternate angle of the play that reveals the ref falling down proper as Jackson is about to run by him in an try to keep away from the 49ers go rush:
If the official can’t get out of the best way, ought to the refs actually nonetheless name intentional grounding? It appears like a ‘letter of the legislation vs. spirit of the rule’ sort of debate.
The ref’s face as he’s falling down may simply be the final nice sports activities meme of 2023. Let it wash throughout you:
The ref is Alex Moore. It’s doable that Moore falling wouldn’t have modified the end result of the play: the San Fran go rush was coming was coming for Lamar, and he wasn’t going to have a lot time to eliminate the ball both approach. Nonetheless, it’s a troublesome break for the Ravens after they might have been punting — and forestall two factors — with out the penalty.
We’ll see if the security finally ends up altering the end result of the sport.