Tuesday Morning Quarterback: It’s Tax Breaks for College Football Trump Should Care About

Speaking of Congress, why does it allow donations to college football programs to be tax deductible?

Ryan Brewer, a professor at the wonderfully named Indiana University-Purdue University Columbus, showed last month that the Ohio State, Texas, and Oklahoma football programs all are worth at least $1 billion, with Ohio State topping the inventory at a $1.5 billion valuation. Yet donations to these programs are tax deductible, as are most donations to college athletics. That means average taxpayers who can only dream of sitting in a luxury suite for the Texas-Oklahoma Red River game, or any big-deal collegiate football event, are taxed to subsidize the high-roller class of college sports.

Money gifts to colleges and universities long have been deductible, and with good reason—higher education contributes to the welfare of society. But college sport, however exciting, makes no such contribution. Major college football and men’s basketball programs have little if any connection to the life of their sponsoring universities: They are businesses leasing a school’s logos, traditions, and, most important, tax exemptions.

Bad enough that Nick Saban will earn $11 million this year backed by a booster fund to which donations are deductible, or that many big-college coaches enjoy stratospheric pay with tax-break support. Brad Wolverton and Sandhya Kambhampati of the Chronicle of Higher Education calculate that a total of $1.2 billion was donated to NCAA sports in 2015. Assuming as seems fair that most donations came from top-bracket filers, this represents about $350 million that year transferred from average taxpayers to college sports. (The cost of game tickets generally cannot be deducted; nearly all other payments to college athletic departments are structured as charitable gifts.) No one likes taxes—I certainly don’t. But whenever government confers tax breaks, either taxes on average people must rise, or debt must grow. So why is college sports subsidized by the tax code? Why can’t it pay its own way?

Ohio State football certainly could pay its own way. This invaluable resource shows that in the most recent year, Buckeyes football spent $37.3 million to gain $86.6 million in revenue, for a yield of $49 million—nearly all the sums involved tax-exempt.

Ohio State football’s educational performance is laughable. In the most recent year posted by the NCAA, for students entering as freshmen in 2009, just 47 percent of Ohio State football players graduated, versus 83 percent of all Ohio State students under the same metric. Adjust for a few juniors who left early for the NFL, and Ohio State football’s educational results remain shameful compared to students as a whole at the same college.

Sure, many football fans don’t care if the players do not receive meaningful educations. (The bachelor’s degree is the big reward for accepting the risks of college football, as the majority of players, even at top-ranked programs, never advance to NFL game checks.) But if the players aren’t receiving meaningful educations, where is the rationale for tax favors?

College football eagerly solicits tax-exempt donations. Send a $25,000 check to the Buckeye Club and claim a $23,965 deduction by the school’s calculation—meaning a top-rate filer actually spends $18,000 to donate $25,000, with average taxpayers covering the other $7,000. The gift—remember, on paper it looks like support of higher education—will get you such perks as the “opportunity to purchase a football season parking permit” and an “invitation to a special event with athletics director.” The more you donate, the more points you earn, with nearly all your costs being tax breaks.

Many college football programs now mimic high-prestige university endowments while allowing donors to soak up perks, and tax deductions, when “endowing” coaches.

At Stanford, David Shaw isn’t just the football coach, he is the Bradford M. Freeman Director of Football, backed by a tax-favored endowment. At Michigan, Jim Harbaugh is the J. Ira and Nicki Harris Family Head Football Coach, while Don Brown is the Matthew and Nicole Lester Family Football Defensive Coordinator. Want to become a benefactor of Michigan football? You could endow the Tackles and Tight Ends Coach—that job hasn’t been chaired yet. Boosters of USC can even donate to the Song Girls, claiming a tax exemption.

There are many arguments concerning the health impacts of football. Last week’s column argued that health risks are acceptable for professionals; are not as bad as they might seem for college and high school players; and need to be eliminated for the young by banning youth tackle football.

But there are no arguments supporting tax favors for NFL and NCAA football programs that roll in money. If Congress is too timorous to address this, then what issue does the House and Senate have the courage to face?

Stats of the Week #1. Dolphins second-half possession results in their comeback at NFC defending champion Atlanta: touchdown, touchdown, field goal, field goal, kneels to end the game.

Stats of the Week #2. After missing field goals on the final snaps of the first three games, the Chargers hit a field goal on the final snap to defeat Oakland.

Stats of the Week #3. Since the start of the 2016 season, Kansas City is 0-3 versus Pittsburgh, and 17-3 versus all other teams.

Stats of the Week #4. First against points in 2016, the New England defense is now 30th against points.

Stats of the Week #5. Minnesota and New Orleans both got to week six before throwing an interception.

Stats of the Week #6. The University of Louisville, whose quarterback Lamar Jackson won the Heisman Trophy last December, is on a 4-6 stretch.

Stats of the Week #7. All last season the Panthers got 43 receptions from their tailbacks. After six games, rookie Carolina tailback Christian McCaffrey has 37 receptions.

Stats of the Week #8. Since entering the NFL, Cam Newton has more rushing touchdowns than every NFL running back except Marshawn Lynch. (Noted by Michael David Smith of profootballtalk.com.)

Stats of the Week #9. The 0-6 Santa Clara 49ers have lost five consecutive games by a field goal or less.

Stats of the Week #10. Since taking a seemingly insurmountable lead in the second half of the Super Bowl, the Falcons are 3-3.

It’s gotten away early this year for Matt Ryan and the Atlanta Falcons (3-3). (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

Sweet Pair of Plays Versus the NFC Defending Champions. Trailing 17-0 in the third quarter at Atlanta, Miami faced 4th-and-1 on the Falcons’ 17. Rather than do the “safe” thing and trot out a kicker, head coach Adam Gase went for it: conversion, touchdown on the possession. Then, trailing 17-14 in the fourth quarter and facing 4th-and-2 at midfield, rather than do the “safe” thing and send out a punter, Adam Gase went for it: conversion, field goal on the possession, and soon the Epic Fails had allowed another comeback.

Sour Giants Plays Occurring Before This Week. Giants head coach Ben McAdoo has insisted on calling offensive plays, despite his poor performance in the role, especially during the 2015 season. A week ago, down 27-22 at home to the Chargers with 38 seconds remaining, LA/B facing 2nd-and-12, McAdoo called time out to force Philip Rivers to stage a meaningless extra kneel-down—a futile gesture that made McAdoo seem in over his head. Just as some athletes perform better than others during gameday conditions, some coaches are better than others when the light comes on, and McAdoo just doesn’t seem to call plays well under pressure.

This week, he ceded playcalling duties to offensive coordinator Mike Sullivan, and the Giants upset favored Denver on the road. Playcalling is but one of many aspects of football—but if the head coach seems in over his head, players know. Sullivan called a perfectly timed trap-block interior run that gained 47 yards versus the league’s top-ranked rush defense, setting up a touchdown. The interior trap is a standard action from the high school level upward—but when’s the last time you saw the Giants use it? Coaches always want better performance from their players. When players get better performance from their coaches, outcomes improve.

Sweet ‘n’ Sour Pair of Plays Versus the NFL Defending Champions. Late in the first half, Jersey/B, on a 2-10 stretch to the defending champion Patriots, intercepted Tom Brady when he threw deep into double coverage. Sweet.

Then with 22 seconds until intermission, the Patriots on the Jets 44 yard line and holding only one time out, the Jets let New England speed receiver Brandin Cooks get deep on a fly route, not challenged by a safety. There are 22 seconds remaining and the Patriots have only one time out—where do you think the pass will go? Maybe up the field! Caught near the Jersey/B goal line, Flying Elvii touchdown just before halftime. Sour.

Eagles Make the Call That Falcons Were Afraid to Make. During the preseason, Tuesday Morning Quarterback noted one of the hidden plays of the Atlanta-New England Super Bowl. The Patriots committed a foul before the snap of a Falcons’ PAT kick, and rather than advance the spot to the 1 then go for a deuce, Dan Quinn kicked anyway, throwing away the golden opportunity for an additional point. I asked, “Don’t you think Atlanta would have liked one additional point when the Flying Elvii tied game in final minute of regulation?”

Eagles at Panthers, Philadelphia recorded a touchdown to make the score 16-10, then the Cats used an illegal formation on a successful PAT kick. Because NFL coaches almost always do the “safe” thing with kickers, referee Pete Morelli did not even consult the Philadelphia sideline before announcing the Eagles would accept the five yards on the ensuing kickoff. But Doug Pederson—who started as a head coach in high school, where the deuce rules—signaled his offense back onto the field. The spot was advanced half the distance, to the Carolina 1, and Philadelphia’s deuce succeeded, making the score 18-10 and visibly deflating the Cats.

Visiting Southern Cal, Utah recorded a touchdown with 42 seconds remaining to make the scoreboard read TROJANS 28 UTES 27. The safe choice, surely the choice of nearly all football coaches, would be to kick a PAT and head for overtime. Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham went for two and victory; USC stopped the play, and the Song Girls danced. Though Utah’s strategy did not work, going for the win was sound. Overtime in the college and high school format of alternating possessions is a 50/50 proposition, and coaches tend to believe—I don’t know if this can be shown with statistics—that in the alternating-possessions format, the home team, benefitting from crowd energy, is more likely to prevail. By going all-in to win, Whittingham showed his team that he wasn’t afraid of favorites, pollsters, or the sports press: a good sign for Utah.

At some juncture this season Tuesday Morning Quarterback will fulminate against the NFL overtime format, which continues to make the coin flip important; the college and high school formats eliminate the odd custom of granting a fifth-quarter advantage based on chance.

Good News for the Human Prospect. In recent years a seemingly pure PC notion about race has developed: that “race” is a social construct, not a biological fact, with black and white people no more representing differing types of people than blondes and redheads represent differing races. Last week this notion took a major step toward becoming hard science with this study, led by Sarah Tishkoff, a geneticist at Penn; Carl Zimmer of the New York Times puts the research into plain English. If science continues to uphold the idea there are no substantial genetic distinctions among people with differing appearances, the human prospect will improve, because it will become possible to imagine a future in which bigotry in all forms withers away.

The new study is a gigantic vindication for the 2002 book Mapping Human History, by Steve Olson. Fifteen years ago, Olson laid out, using mathematics and the histories of migrations, a detailed argument that skin color does not signal any substantive aspect of biology. Olson had almost the entire case, lacking only the DNA sequencing data released last week by the Penn researchers. Olson’s book calculated that everyone alive today has a common ancestor who lived not in the mists of prehistory but no more than 3,000 years ago. That’s almost on the dot of the time scales depicted in the new study.

Mapping Human History should have been received as the first really major book of the new century, especially considering Olson’s credentials in science writing. It’s time for this outstanding book to find a new audience.

At This Point There Must Be Casting Directors Who Specialize in Traitors. As Elaine Godfrey shows, Donald Trump is the most television-obsessed of presidents, watching the tube for hours on end. Presumably he appeals to voters who watch a lot of TV. What do people who tune in to the major networks behold? In recent years, show after show that depict the United States government in the hands of traitors. Perhaps there is a link between Trump telling voters that Washington, D.C., was actively trying to ruin the United States, and the imaginary celluloid world where this happens.

(Here’s your obligatory “spoiler alert” about the plots of some small-screen shows.) The latest season of Homeland, for instance, wrapped with the CIA dragging away members of the cabinet so traitors in the White House could rip up the Constitution. In the latest iteration of Fox’s 24, the Director of National Intelligence secretly is an Islamist fanatic who cackles about slaughtering innocent Americans. On NBC’s Timeless, America is secretly run by “Rittenhouse,” a Freemason-style plot whose goal is to turn the United States into an absolute dictatorship. Among other things, the show’s protagonists discover that the 18-minute gap in the Watergate tapes was to erase Richard Nixon discussing his fear of being murdered by the all-powerful Rittenhouse puppet-masters. On ABC’s Designated Survivor, traitors at the top blow up the Capitol during the State of the Union Address, murdering most of America’s government—a government so incompetent that no one noticed thousands of pounds of explosives being placed under the Capitol Dome.

But let’s focus on the primetime shows that voters, and presumably Trump, were watching in the runup to the November 2016 vote.

On CBS’s Madam Secretary, which has more viewers than 60 Minutes, the CIA director is a traitor who orders the murder of the secretary of State. When the noble Betsy McCord, protagonist of the show, takes the job, the CIA director wants her dead, too. On CBS’s Hawaii Five-0, the CIA helps a drug cartel smuggle planeloads of cocaine into the United States so that, a noble Honolulu detective realizes to his horror, “the Columbian housing market does not collapse, which would reduce profits at the big banks.” In the many iterations of 24, rare is the White House official who does not serve the Chinese, the Russians, or a shadowy international organization.

Pause here to ask: Does the subliminal content of celluloid impact viewer behavior? Studies of children are clear that it does; studies of adults reach no clear conclusion.

For the last generation, movie and television producers have refrained from glamorizing smoking. Generally cigarettes are not depicted, excepted in scenes set in the past, and lighting up is never shown as pleasurable or chic. This constraint is based on the assumption viewers are impressionable, and believe what they see. During the same period, TV and movie producers increasingly have glorified violence, including by posing movie stars waving around guns.

So what do we observe in the period? America has less smoking and more firearm atrocities, exactly the subliminal message being sold on the screen.

Kiefer Sutherland: Formerly Jack Bauer (24), currently President Tom Kirkman (Designated Survivor), and seemingly always reacting to the crimes of fictional traitors. (Tony Barson/FilmMagic)

Presuming movie and TV subliminal effects are not confined to cigarettes and guns, we might expect audiences to believe the traitor-at-the-top line recently being sold. And now for many more examples from the runup to election victory by the screen-obsessed Trump.

All five Tom Cruise Mission: Impossible films include traitors at the highest levels of the White House or U.S. intelligence. The three most recent James Bond movies, Quantum of Solace (2008), Skyfall (2012), and Spectre (2015), had highly placed traitors in British or American government. Captain America: The Winter Soldier, among the box office hits of 2014, was about a traitor at the top in Washington. The oily villain, played by Robert Redford, wants to use the “World Security Council” to end liberty in the United States.

In several of the popular X-Men flicks, not mutants but government conspirators are the true enemy of mankind. The first X-Men movie during the Barack Obama presidency, X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), concerned a traitor who seized control of the U.S. military. The year 2014 would see $750 million in ticket sales for X-Men: Days of Future Past, a star-studded film about a secret White House project to build a robot army to enforce dictatorship. Benedict Arnold has even reached outer space. The highest-grossing Captain Kirk movie ever, Star Trek Into Darkness (2012), features a smirking traitor in the big chair at Starfleet.

Of course these movies are absurd, and most in the audience receive them as such. But the subliminal message—government is run by people who want to sell you down the river—may accumulate with enough people to affect the outcome in a swing state. And the Cineplex is nothing compared to primetime fare beamed into America’s living rooms, which seems telling since Trump and his backers are a TV-focused demographic.

CBS’s NCIS, the number-one primetime drama series for many recent seasons, has too many government traitors to count. Unforgettable, which ran on CBS from 2011 to 2014, included a plot arc in which valorous NYPD detectives discover the Truthers are right: 9-11 was an inside job carried out by traitors at the top of American government.

The NBC hit The Blacklist gave viewers an attorney general and a national security advisor who are traitors. For good measure, The Blacklist had the CIA staging terrorist bombings to kill American civilians, in hopes of getting a budget increase. The premise of the 2014 NBC series State of Affairs was a high-ranking Pentagon traitor helping an Osama bin-Liden-like figure conduct terror attacks on U.S. soil. The premise of the 2015 NBC primetime series American Odyssey was that the Pentagon is funding terrorism to justify a defense budget increase. In the series, when U.S. commandos stumble onto evidence of what’s really going on, the high-ranking traitors order an airstrike that kills our own soldiers, then send government-funded mercenaries to murder journalists trying to warn the public. (American Odyssey was cancelled before the Big Reveal, which surely would have been why the prime minister of Greece was played by an Irish actress using a French accent.)

The premise of the 2013 NBC series Crisis was that the CIA director was a traitor who controlled hit squads that traveled the United States gunning down whole families of anyone who criticized the Washington establishment. When a valorous FBI agent stumbles onto evidence of what’s happening, the CIA murders some FBI officials and hangs their bodies from Potomac River bridges, as a warning to the FBI to back off. This, seemingly, is what Comcast, owner of NBC, wanted viewers to think the nation’s capital is like.

Over on ABC, the 2012 primetime series Last Resort concerned a double-agent president who, following instructions from shadowy billionaires, orders a nuclear first strike on Pakistan, hoping to start World War III. With Obama the actual president, ABC, owned by Disney, offered viewers a series premised on high treason in the Oval Office.

In action movies and primetime drama, often the treasonous act makes no sense. Suppose the shadowy billionaires of Last Resort succeeded in starting Armageddon: How, exactly, would their hedge funds benefit? That actions of cinematic traitors make no sense carries over into the Trump worldview. He wanted his backers to think Washington officials actually sought to destroy jobs, hollow out the armed forces, and tolerate terrorism. What incentive would they have to desire such ends? Why would Democratic party politicians, dependent on campaign donations from unions, scheme to get rid of the UMW and UAW? Trump offered little or no proof, rather, only implied that if something happens that we don’t like, it must be because of insidious forces. That’s exactly the worldview of primetime and big-studio treason plots.

James Spader as Raymond ‘Red’ Reddington in The Blacklist. (Will Hart/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images)

Now consider what was shown on United Kingdom screens in the runup to Brexit. In February 2016, the BBC extensively touted a primetime miniseries, The Night Manager, whose premise was a high-ranking traitor at the top of British government. In May 2016, a big-budget movie, Our Kind of Traitor, opened in London: Its premise involved a high-ranking traitor at the top of British government. The movie and miniseries presented Ewan McGregor and Tom Hiddleston, two of the U.K.’s top movie stars, engaged in desperate struggles to prevent England from being sold down the river to other nations. Then in June 2016, United Kingdom citizens voted, by a close margin, to leave the European Union.

Of course most viewers don’t fall for Hollywood drivel. But ridiculous treason-at-the-top entertainment needed only influence voters at the margins to have been a factor in the 2016 presidential election and the Brexit ballot.

Worst Crowd Reaction. As the Broncos trotted off for intermission, trailing winless Jersey/A, the Colorado home crowd booed lustily. Sure you won the Super Bowl less than two years ago. But what have you done for us lately?

Sweet Play Bonus #1. The Bears are foundering at 2-4, but have the league’s two sweetest plays of the season so far.

Versus Minnesota, Chicago ran a successful deuce that was not only handoff-handoff-pitch-to-the-quarterback, one of the handoffs went to a tight end. Versus Baltimore, Chicago tossed to 5’6” rookie tailback Tarik Cohen, offered no scholarship by nearly all college programs because of his height, who threw a touchdown pass to tight end Zach Miller, one of the ball-handlers for the deuce’s success. On tailback passes, players are coached like this: Throw only if the receiver is totally uncovered, otherwise just run, and we don’t care if you lose yardage so long as you don’t commit a turnover. Cohen got the toss, saw Miller totally uncovered—the defense surely assumed a 5’6” guy would not be looking downfield—and threw a perfect strike.

Sweet Play Bonus #2. Andy Reid went for it on 4th-and-2 at the Steelers 4 yard line—and failed, but normally going for it close challenges a team to win. Indeed, Kansas City got a touchdown on its next possession. Now it’s Pittsburgh 12 Kansas City 10 with a little more than three minutes remaining, Hypocycloids facing 3rd-and-2 at midfield. Pittsburgh went empty (3rd-and-2 is a passing down for a surprising number of contemporary NFL teams). Antonio Brown ran a short combo route with another wide receiver; the play was drawn up to get Brown loose for a short gain and the first down. The ball ricocheted around, Brown snagged it, and then not one but two Kansas City defensive backs failed to simply wrap him up. It was a 51-yard touchdown catch-and-run, and Kansas City loses to the Steelers at home for the second time in 10 months.

Cleveland Tanking Report. TMQ noted in the preseason that the Browns, in the last five drafts, have had the greatest bonanza since the Cowboys following the Hershel Walker trade. Though Dallas’s draft bonanza led to multiple Super Bowl rings, the Browns remain horrible. Now Cleveland is 0-6. Sunday, quarterback Kevin Hogan threw three interceptions, plus an intentional grounding from the end zone, resulting in a safety. On the season so far, Browns quarterbacks have tossed seven more interceptions than touchdowns. (New England has 11 more touchdown passes than interceptions, and even struggling Cincinnati has more touchdown passes than picks.) Not only does Cleveland head coach Hue Jackson seem to have no idea what he’s doing, he admits in public to having no idea what he’s doing. Ye gods.

The NBA Tips Off Tonight; Let the Tanking Begin. Normally sophisticated observers (me) thought the Bills and Jets were tanking this season; instead, so far they are a combined 6-5, with the Jets taking the defending champions Patriots to the wire on Sunday.

Then there’s the Philadelphia 76ers. Years of determined tanking left them in position to select the first-overall players in the 2016 and then 2017 basketball drafts. So will the Sixers finally deliver their long-promised playoff run? Philadelphia just gave a maximum contract extension to center Joel Embiid—who has only actually played in 59 games in the last four years. That’s of 279 games by his college and pro teams in that span. Now the Sixers owe Embiid $154 million through 2023. Why this mega-deal for a perpetually injured athlete, particularly as an extension for a guy who was already under contract? Now the Sixers have a built-in excuse for more years of losing: “We had no idea Joel would get hurt, and our salary cap is all wrapped up in his contract.”

The Philadelphia 76ers’ Joel Embiid: Über-talented, über-rich, and constantly injured. The 23-year-old center just signed a 148 million-dollar contract extension despite missing his first two seasons entirely and playing only 31 games last year. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

Quality of play in the NBA has been strong in recent years, capped by three consecutive fabulous finals rounds between Cleveland and Golden State. But pro basketball seems to be evolving into a bifurcated league in which a handful of clubs go all-out to win (Golden State, Boston, San Antonio, Cleveland, Houston), a handful actively try to lose, and the league’s middle class—the dozen or so teams that are not terrible, but know they have no chance whatsoever of winning the title—essentially stage exhibition contests. This season’s OKC team, with Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and Carmelo Anthony, will be a lot of fun to watch, and surely a popular draw on the road. But its games will be like Globetrotters appearances: The stars will take turns showing amazing moves, audiences will cheer, and the Thunder will make an early playoff exit. In the NFL, almost every game matters to the standings and playoff seeding: This season in the NBA, by Christmas, half the games will mean nothing, other than as a source of entertainment.

Most Football Teams Don’t Practice Letting the Opponent Score. Leading 24-23, LSU took possession at the Auburn 25 with 1:38 remaining in the annual Tigers versus Tigers matchup, Auburn down to two time outs. Gus Malzahn, head coach of Auburn, should have ordered his defenders to stand aside and let LSU score. Had LSU recorded a quick touchdown, then all but surely taken a single PAT, it would have given Auburn about a minute and a half, and two time outs, to try for a touchdown and a deuce to force overtime. A long shot to be sure, but at least a shot: essentially the situation Bill Belichick faced at the endgame of Super Bowl XLVI, when he ordered his charges to let the Giants score.

Instead Malzahn employed conventional defensive tactics. After three rushes up the middle, forcing Auburn to expend its time outs, LSU kicked a field goal for a 27-23 lead. Auburn got the ball back with 38 seconds and no time outs, needing a touchdown—a nearly hopeless hand.

If LSU had been playing the New England Patriots, it’s likely the let-them-score tactic would have been used, since there are no AP or coaches polls in the NFL—all that matters is Ws and Ls. In college ball, for favored, ranked Auburn to lose by four points on the road is a lot less bad than if Malzahn had allowed a touchdown and lost by eight points—late in the season at bowl-selection time, that might have been held against him. TMQ would like to know if LSU coaches told their runners not to score, should Auburn stand aside. A ballcarrier refusing to score in one of the college football world’s big game of the season would have made a wonderful highlight-reel addition.

The Football Gods Chortled. Trailing number-one Alabama 24-0 in the second half, Arkansas kicked a field goal from the Crimson Tide 12. Obviously this meant Arkansas was no longer even trying to win the game. The kick prevented Razorbacks boosters from complaining of coach Bret Bielema, “We got shut out at Alabama.”

Gimmick scheduling note: The contest was in Alabama where the Crimson Tide, following a neutral-site opener, play seven home games versus four road dates. This is as if the Kansas City Chiefs had 10 games at home, six on the road. Each year in college football, many top-ranked teams are top-ranked partly because their schedules are wired.

Adventures in Officiating. Defending champion New England leading 24-14 in the second half, the Jets’ Austin Seferian-Jenkins caught a pass, dove at the pylon, and SCORED A TOUCHDOWN. Zebras reviewed and reversed to a fumble out of the end zone for a Patriots touchback. This play WAS A TOUCHDOWN. With Robert Kraft the most politically connected of NFL owners, many football fans believe—rightly or wrongly— that New England wins so much in part because zebras favor the Flying Elvii.

In the fourth quarter of Nesharim at Panthers, the home team was flagged for delay-of-game, which normally stops the play. All Carolina players relaxed: Cam Newton stood holding the ball, but a Philadelphia lineman hammered Newton to the ground. A dead-ball roughing the passer penalty changed what would have been 3rd-and-15 for the Cats into 1st-and-10 on the Philadelphia 12. Carolina scored a touchdown on the possession. Philadelphia players claimed there was no whistle for delay-of-game, so they thought the ball was live. From the film it’s impossible to tell if the whistle sounded. By halting, the Cats players acted as though they heard something.

An obscure aspect of football officiating is that in most cases the whistle is not what ends the play, rather, as officiating manuals say, “The action of the play is what ends the play.” Seen that way, the action of the play had ended the play, and Philadelphia defenders should have pulled up. But on a practical basis, players listen for the whistle—and should.

What made your columnist scratch his head is that referee Pete Morelli, who Eagles fans have long accused of bias against their club, announced the delay-of-game penalty had been declined, and that only the roughing flag would be enforced. But Carolina couldn’t decline a penalty committed by Carolina, and it’s hard to believe the Eagles declined an opponent’s penalty. Generally a major penalty does not offset a minor penalty. But that’s not what Morelli announced. So who declined the delay-of-game flag?

Hell’s Sports Bar. A week ago Hell’s Sports Bar was doing a lively trade in pitchers of craft-brewed brimstone as the infinite number of TVs showed only Chargers-Giants (combined record 0-8), Colts-49ers (combined record 1-7), and Browns-Jets (combined record 2-6). This week offered a slate of competitive games, so Hell’s Sports Bar closed for renovations. When the doors reopen, patrons will be able to order Buffalo wings with a selection of sauces – except, they will have to rip the wings off a live roster.

The 500 Club. Hosting Hiram, Kenyon College, a hipster school with a student-operated organic farm, gained 549 yards of offense, scored 56 points, and lost. Sports teams of Hiram College are the Terriers: Fans should chant, “Here boy! Here boy!”

The 600 Club. Hosting Boston College, which entered with a 2-4 record, Louisville gained 625 yards, and lost. Reader Joe Girthoffer of Omaha reports that in Nebraska prep action, Bellevue West hung 62 points on Omaha Westside, and lost.

Obscure College Score. Mount Ida 14, Dean 7. Well of course an entire college defeated just one guy! Located in Franklin, Massachusetts, Dean College offers a course in stunt fighting for stage and cinema.

Next Week. With a season-ending injury to J.J. Watt and a possible one to Aaron Rodgers, this would seem to get me off the hook for my predictions the Texans and Packers would reach the Super Bowl. What Super Bowl should I forecast now? Hmmm, maybe Eagles versus Steelers. That would cause Hillary Clinton to rethink her (or her highly paid bumbling advisors’) decision to use New Jersey entertainers to campaign in Pennsylvania.