During the ManningCast altcast of last night’s Monday Night Football between the Los Angeles Rams and visiting Buffalo Bills, the Manning brothers took some issue with how the referees might have impacted the game.
The big issue occurred midway through overtime when Rams kicker Harrison Mevis lined up for a potential game-winning field goal from 48 yards. As Peyton and Eli watched with Jim Nantz, Peyton took issue with the clock suddenly stopping. The Hall of Fame QB accused the referees of “icing” Mevis with no explanation.
“There’s no timeouts, why is the clocked stopped?” Manning demanded. “The referees are icing him. That’s nice. No explanation.”
“Icing the kicker” is the act of calling a timeout before a field goal, which supposedly causes field goal kickers to overthink and ultimately miss their field goals. There’s no statistical evidence that it actually works, but it’s usually a low-risk strategy.
After Peyton and Eli argued over the play and bashed the referees, Mevis’ kick wound up being blocked by Gregory Rousseau. The Bills subsequently drove down 35 yards to set up Tyler Bass for a game-winning field goal of his own.
Solving the Controversy
The answer to Manning’s questions came from Joe Buck and Troy Aikman moments later. The two ESPN commentators explained that the officials re-spotted the ball. But rather than allow the play clock to wind down, Rams head coach Sean McVay demanded a play clock reset.
Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images.
McVay apologized for putting his team in that position in the first place.
“I’m sick that we came up short and I’ll be regretting kicking that and not having a better call to be able to go for it on third down and go to fourth or whatever it was. And that’s on me,” McVay said, via the New York Post.
Unfortunately, Mevis is the only one who lost his job over the controversy. He was released hours after missing that kick and another field goal, and the team has since signed Blake Grupe to be their new kicker moving forward.
