One blown PI call has LA Rams placed into endless salary cap loop

That one play, that singular moment that sent the LA Rams to their first and only Super Bowl appearance under Head Coach Sean McVay was controversial, to say the least. It was a pass interference call (or non-call)  that will infamously live on in NFL lore forever, as well as Rams’ fans’ memories.

The pass from New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees to a wide-open Tommy Lee Lewis, a play that slot cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman broke up. Except he arrived a second before the ball did, thumping the receiver with a huge shoulder block that forced Lewis off his feet.

An incomplete pass was the call on the field. No replay. Outrage ensued, so much so that the rules of pass interference were changed the following year and NFL referees received new (ahem) guidance on making such calls a new point of emphasis.

While the outcome of that game was by no means reversed by that play, there were non-calls that went the Saints’ way in that game too. Such as this facemask on QB Jared Goff that was not called.

You win some, you lose some.  That’s the game of professional football. The human element which some football purists think today’s game has largely legislated out of existence. The electronic Eye in the Sky known as replay makes those calls now. Some say it’s better this way. Oh really?

Or has the new method simply taken referees off the hook? Do they no longer look twice before making a controversial call, with the expectation that someone behind a monitor will make it right? What was the real outcome of that game, anyway?