Bills coach Rex Ryan was steaming after last night’s loss to the Seahawks, saying that the officiating mistakes at the end of the first half hurt his team.
“Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous,” Ryan said. “It was wrong.”
As the Bills lined up for a field goal just before halftime, Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman jumped offside and drilled kicker Rob Carpenter. Sherman was flagged for offside, but not for unnecessary roughness, which the NFL has since admitted should have been called. The officials further botched the matter by calling the Bills for delay of game after the officials were late getting the ball on the field, which the NFL has again admitted shouldn’t have happened.
“It’s clear what happened. The guy roughed our kicker. Jumps offside and roughs our kicker, and then because we had to go out and attend to him because it wasn’t called roughing the kicker, we had to spike the ball,” Ryan said. “Then, of course, they’ve got to put the K-ball out there and they don’t reset the clock. So from an officiating standpoint I think you can do a little better than that.
After Sherman had an interception later in the game, he and Ryan had words, which Ryan said were both because of the hit on Carpenter and because Sherman was glaring at him and others on the Bills’ sideline.
“He is mean-mugging like he’s doing,” Ryan said. “The guy is a great player. . . . It was a ridiculous play. Then he is over on the sideline basically taunting us. So I had some words. I think I said that ‘you’re too good a player to act like an ass.’ I think that’s what I said.”