It’s a post-truth nation, so why shouldn’t it include a post-truth National Football League?
A popular theory has emerged in the wake of Thursday night’s Raiders-Chiefs game regarding an errant fourth-quarter throw from Oakland quarterback Derek Carr to receiver Amari Cooper. Carr, who moved forward from the pocket to escape pressure before spotting Cooper open for what could have been an easy catch and run for a touchdown in an eight-point game, threw a wobbly pass that flat-out missed Cooper.
The easy explanation is that a quarterback who completed only 17 of 41 passes on the night misfired. But some think the ball hit a wire that supports the camera that hovers over the field.
NBC Sports spokesman Dan Masonson told John Hickey of the Bay Area News Group that "[t]he overhead camera is positioned behind the line of scrimmage, so the cables would not be in play.”
Hickey wasn’t prepared to buy that one completely, arguing that “the wires were still there.”
Even if they were, the image from the camera would have moved if the wire had been struck. Thursday Night Football executive producer Fred Gaudelli tells PFT that the image from the camera showed no disruption during the play.
“The camera would have shaken,” Gaudelli said via email. “On the replay you can see the shot was stable.”
So there’s the truth. Whether that matters in a post-truth nation is a separate issue.