Call Sheet: The Michigan clock controversy is another example of football's growing credibility problem

0:00All right, everyone. Welcome to a Monday morning episode of the Call Sheet podcast here at the fans first sports network. Kevin Smith your host exciting week of football, the NFL kicks off a long buildup. The off season seemed to take forever, but we are here kick off just a couple days away. Football already being played all over the country. Good weekend of football here at the Smith House, the Ocean City Red Raiders. One, our second straight game, two and O to start the season just knocked off a defending state champ over the weekend by the odd score of six to two. That's a score, a gamy for me, never been a part of a six to two game before my son's eighth grade team, they open their season with a win. Good weekend of football at the Smith House, but was it a good weekend of football across the country for the brand.

1:05Did the game of football have a good rollout, particularly on the college level, and we asked that question because of the controversy that everyone's talking about the university of Michigan, a 27 and a half point favorite at home in the big house against a small in state Mac school western Michigan. These are the games that a school like Michigan are expected to win by 40 or so. You're going to roll over an over matched in state foe. You're going to write him a check and give it to him and say, hey, thanks for coming. There are rosters as full of guys who you probably bypassed. Michigan is full of three, four and five star guys. Western Michigan, probably the one, the two, maybe the occasional three star players, generally speaking, the Michigan players are the guys who the university really wanted the Western Michigan players are the ones they may have invited up to watch a game, but ultimately decided no thanks.

2:15And if you're Western Michigan, you go into a game like that with a chip on your shoulder, but 99 times out of 100 Michigan rolls you. That was not the case on Saturday night as you got to the final play of the game with Michigan with the football right around their own right around midfield trailing 12 to 7, needing a miracle of a Hail Mary to avoid a miserable upset on national. On national television to their in state little brother, so to speak. And we all know what happens. They throw it a pass. It's incomplete. Time runs out. Western Michigan celebrates the replay show that there's no time remaining. But then things linger and linger and linger and then the call comes from upstairs that there's a second left on the clock. And they put that second back on and Michigan gets a second crack at the Hail Mary and they convert and avoid a massive upset and win 1312.

3:19And the Michigan fans, look, people are going to criticize me for this. I don't care. I think field storming should be reserved for a like when you pull a huge upset, you shouldn't storm the field when like your six and three team beats another six and three team. I see that happening now or or or maybe maybe it's more like when you're four and five team beat a six and three team that's ranked 24th in the country. Like that's not a field storm. You you not you upset a top 10 team storm the field. You avoid being upset as a 27 and a half point favorite man, you should you should thank God and leave the stadium. You should storm the field for that universe the of Michigan fans storming the field after big gifted a second opportunity to avoid an upset as a 27 and a half point favorite as that is in my mind, not a field storming moment.

4:20What the hell kids have fun. What we of course know now is that the controversy surrounding the decision to put a second back on the clock is one that stems from big 10 replay officials who were upstairs in a booth or in an office somewhere on even know where they were exactly using a clock that was different from the clock that was on display for everyone the stadium clock, which you can see obviously in the stadium, which you can see on TV. And as you looked at the stadium clock, it was clear that when the initial hell Mary pass struck a Western Michigan defender, which would have killed the play. There was no time remaining clear as day, no time remaining, no one disputes that the problem is that's not the clock, the big 10 replay officials were using and they were using some some other clock that is it's not spelled out in the NCA.

5:20In the NCA instant replay rule book, which there's a that's a thing which clock is to be used or if an official clock exists there's no reference to that. So and it says that the officials are not directed to use the game clock that is superimposed on the replay monitor, meaning like the one that's everybody can see in the stadium. They have their own side clock that only a couple people are privy to and it was that side clock, which the big 10 says was running or that the game clock was running for 10 to the second behind that side clock. And that's why there was a second remaining when the replay officials looked at the clock they were using versus the one everyone else saw. And while Western Michigan give them all the credit in the world was incredibly gracious in accepting this result. It's a problem. It's still a problem.

6:23It's a problem because of transparency and this is the issue that right now is a problem for football in general that there is a lack of faith amongst the general public. That football is transparent that the game that you're seeing is not fixed in some way, shape or form. And we'll get into right now all the reasons for that. But again, a side clock that only the big 10 officials who would certainly be incentivized if there were a question as to whether or not any time remained to rule in favor of the big 10's representative in that kind of way. And that was a negative in that contest that was on the doorstep of an unbelievably embarrassing loss on a big national stage to a smaller in state rival from a lesser conference.

7:24If there's any doubt who that ruling should go in favor of those big 10 officials are going to err on the side of Michigan. And when they're the only ones privy to the real clock, but the clock that everybody else sees says something very, very different, that's a credibility problem. And it is part of a growing sentiment that football in general, the NFL in particular, but big time football in general is not transparent is not credible. That something something is a foot as they say, something's a foot. Why are there why is there a growing sense that there's a credibility problem? Well, I mean, there are increasing attachments between football and either legal gambling sites like draft kings and bet MGM, all of whom sponsor the NFL, all of whom pay the NFL a lot of money for the lead to promote what they do.

8:28I mean, certain media outlets even promoted to the degree that they're running in game betting promotions for these big gambling houses. Now, it's like NBC will have somebody come on at halftime and say, hey, here's your best second half bets. If you're looking to bet something in the second half, then hey, in third quarter so far this year, the Raiders are blah, blah, blah. That's a great, that's a great in game bet over at draft kings or or futures prediction markets like call she in poly market, the NFL is in tight with those future predictions markets. And sometimes you see things on the field. That makes you go, okay, why, why would you do that? For example, last year, the Browns were playing Las Vegas. And Cleveland was up 14 points with 58 seconds remaining with the ball on the Las Vegas 29 yard line fourth down.

9:39A lot of options that you can do there. You're up 14, all right. Kick a field goal. You go up three scores, the game's over. Now you go up 17 and the game is definitively over. So kicking the field goal is the smart move. But who knows, maybe you're like, hey, we don't want to risk a block and a return. Let's go the safer route. We'll run the ball and we'll run a play. And if we turn it over, fine, they get the ball inside their own 30 with 50 or so seconds to go down 14 were fine, no issues there. But the controversy was this. The over under in that game at the time was one point under the betting line. And the Browns again from Vegas is 29 yard line, punted the ball. They punted from Las Vegas is 29 yard line. Where at that point of 46 yard field goal with today's kickers is basically a layup. And where the yardage you're going to gain is negligible. And when you're turning down points in that situation or not even running a play.

10:53And it gets people talking right. The up. Why they do that because the fix was in man, because the league told them, you're not, you don't score here. We don't want this to go over. It contributes to the larger notion that there's a script. And at the NFL is following the script that the NFL will even drop you clues last year. The league's promotional poster, which they put out right around this time last week, they put it out during the first week of the season. And it was the road to the Super Bowl. And it had, it was it had, it was like kind of drawn almost like a graphic. It wasn't a real photo. It was a graphic. And it had all 32 teams in the photograph. And it had this road leading to the Lombardi trophy for the 2025 season. And at the very, very front of the graphic, you had players from all 32 teams there. The two players that the league chose to put at the very front were Sam Darnell, quarterback for the Seahawks, Drake May, quarterback for the Patriots.

12:03And six months later, as the Super Bowl came up, people dug up that graphic, that promotional welcome to the 2025 season graphic. And they said, look, look who they put at the front of the graphic, Darnell and May. In a year, if you think back a year ago, nobody had Seahawks Patriots in the Super Bowl. The Seahawks were coming off of a 10 and 7 season in which they had missed the playoffs. The Patriots were coming off of a 4 and 13 season. They had fired their coach. Their locker room was in disarray. They were a disaster. Nobody had the Patriots. But the league had Drake May and Sam Darnell at the front of their welcome to the season poster. They're telling us right there, it's fixed. People believe this. And the league doesn't help in their, the way that they conduct themselves. Now, the other issue that arises or that creates a lot of questions is subjectivity, the officiating. It is so subjective.

13:11And we saw that with the Michigan Western Michigan game, don't believe your eyes. Your eyes just told you the games over. There was no time left when that Hail Mary, that first Hail Mary when that play ended. Don't don't believe your eyes because what your eyes just saw, that's not the real clock. The real clock exists elsewhere and only a few privileged big 10 officials have access to it. That's one kind of subjectivity that bothers people. The bigger thing is this. What's roughing the passer? What's pass interference? What's a hit on a defenseless receiver? There are so many moments in football games where two people can watch the same thing happen and have dramatically different opinions on its interpretation. That the changes that have been made in the game.

14:11Most specifically to try to make it a safer product to eliminate vicious hits to eliminate head trauma. They have made the game incredibly subjective. It happens so fast and the rules as to what constitutes a penalty in some of the situations I just named are so vague. That is absolutely possible for it to be a penalty in one game and something that looks exactly the same to not be a penalty in another game. And in the midst of the betting scandals that we have endured throughout sports, big time betting scandals in the NBA in Major League Baseball and even in football, if we think back to last year and the Brandon Sors B issue. Brandon Sors B the quarterback for then Cincinnati transfer to Texas Tech, but then basically got kicked out of college football because of this gambling issue and entered a gambling rehab.

15:14And then the NFL he was so toxic and the NFL was so aware of the problems that they would bring upon themselves if they allowed him into a supplemental draft that they canceled the supplemental draft. Sors B is in limbo for another year. Basically up the league being like we don't need that heat right now. We have so many scandals going on. We don't need that smoke right now. It all contributes to this overwhelming sentiment amongst a segment of the population that the league is rigged. It's rigged. You know, that's a Donald Trump term. We have heard Trump for the last decade telling us that every election under the sun that hasn't gone his way has been rigged. And so it's almost like this mindset that gets set into a portion of the population to be conditioned to think that there is there are powers that be working behind the scenes.

16:18That are orchestrating results and things are not happening organically. And when you have social media and it's prevalence for or preference, I should say for going down rabbit holes to great opportunity for the conspiracy theorist to go off. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. It's today is September 7th. Friday is the 25th anniversary of 9-11. And as we begin to honor that you're going to see and hear and read about and there will be documentaries about all the 9-11 conspiracies. The 9-11 was an inside job, which to me is a disgraceful opinion to hold. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. And the biggest reason is because, and I'm talking about on a grand scale. And the biggest reason is because orchestrating a massive conspiracy like 9-11, like assassinating Kennedy, like faking the moon landing.

17:26It would involve keeping people to shut their mouths, getting people to shut their mouths. And people can't keep secrets. People are horrible at keeping secrets. You're telling me nobody on their deathbed is taking credit for the Kennedy assassination if it was a conspiracy theory. Nobody in 25 years is leaking out how the government engineered 9-11, please. Keeping people silent is the biggest problem in trying to orchestrate a massive conspiracy theory. If the league was being rigged, we would find out. We would find out. I think the problem is incompetence. The problem is human error. It's not human conspiracy. It's human error. And then it's the powers that they trying to massage those errors or cover up those errors or make those errors go away. Like deflate gate and Brady and the Patriots because they were the marquee team in the league.

18:29But everybody knew they were cheating. And how do you massage that? Michigan's been now at the heart of a couple of scandals, but that's Michigan. There are college football blue blood. How do we protect the brand? I think that is the issue. And what's the solution to that transparency? If the NFL were smart, it would 100% adopt the policy that the United Football League adopted when it had live in game explanations of calls from its officiating crew. They had interviews. They a play would occur. That was passion or fear and immediately the on field interviewer would go to the head official and say explain that call. You're getting transparency in the moment. Why didn't if there's a secret clock being used in the Michigan game that only a couple of people have access to. Why weren't their deliberations shown live on television rather than 10 hours later, the video was leaked to people, not leaked, but made public.

19:40The video that showed these these game clock officials looking at their clock as opposed to the clock everybody else saw like 10 hours later a video emerged of that. Why not have it happen in real time. So that we can see. And you can lessen people's fears. At the end of the day, it's not hurting the product right now. Where where where counts most. And that's revenue. The NFL is making money hand over fist college football, especially the major schools and the major conferences is flush with money. Money is flooding into the sport. It's as healthy financially as it's ever been. But when your credibility starts to suffer, you never know when. Things will turn the other way. I think football has got a credit credibility problem. I think they need to do something about it. And of that talk Wednesday, we get to actual football. The lead kicks off Wednesday night. And we'll do our season preview. Haven't done any preview talk because I knew we were going to talk a lot of football over the next couple of months.

20:51And so we'll do our season preview on Wednesday. Can't wait for that. Hey, if you want a ton of football coverage film breakdowns analysis. Check out my ex account at KT Smith football, lot going on there. And of course, keep it here at fans first sports as we bring you the 2026 season. Thank you everybody for listening to and supporting this podcast. I'm tremendous. Thank you.