Out of reach: Carr fumbles short of goal line; index card dictates script
OAKLAND >> Gene Steratore claims he saw football touching yardstick with his own eyes first.
He just needed an index card to feel more confident in his decision. A folded index card.
Photos show what seems to be a clear ball-paper-stick sequence. Yet Steratore reiterated several times in a conversation with a pool reporter that paper played no role in his call. He made up his mind with his own eyes, a decision the index card simply reaffirmed when paper touched ball.
“I don’t want to get fined, OK?” Raiders’ coach Jack Del Rio said. “I’m not happy with the way things were done.
“I saw air. It was pretty obvious.”
In a sequence worthy of its own ‘30 for 30” film on ESPN, referees orchestrated one of the most bizarre reviews you’ll see in an NFL game. Indexcardgate proved a turning point in virtually squashing the Raiders’ playoff hopes, a fate finalized by another rarity, a quarterback fumbling out of the end zone for a touchback.
Derek Carr’s left arm reached for the pylon with under a minute left and the Raiders trailing by three. The ball came loose inches before it needed to before trickling onto white grass. Touchback. Game over. Cowboys 20, Raiders 17.
It’s only fitting the Raiders’ bleak playoff hopes essentially vanished with two plays you’ll rarely see in a game, if ever.
“At the end of the day, we lost,” Carr said. “It is what it is. I can say that we left it out there.”
Carr insisted he’s felt like himself since Game No. 1 of preseason. Yet the 2017 version of Carr looked nothing like the No. 4 of a season ago. One quarterback sniffed the MVP trophy, the other is nowhere near it.
After 13 weeks of transverse process fractures, interceptions galore and more downs than ups, Carr and his coaches vowed this week to “let it rip” after scoring no points in the first three quarters last Sunday. A week’s time remedied nothing, the Raiders remaining scoreless through 30 minutes in a must-win game with Carr’s arm accounting for only 74 yards and a long completion of 14. Really letting it rip, huh?
Unlike the previous Sunday in Kansas City, when the Raiders mustered too little, too late, Oakland was right in this one against a Cowboys team equally as desperate. Trading scores. Fake punts. Even two Raiders interceptions. Sunday night at the Coliseum had all the feel of a playoff game, except two teams teams perceived elite before the season battled for their postseason lives.
With just over five minutes left, the game tied at
17 and Dallas facing fourthand-one from its own 40yard line, quarterback Dak Prescott barged forward on his own. Referees took over a minute to contemplate, bringing out chains, then a folded index card, still seeming perplexed.
Players snapped their arms in both directions, sure their team deserved possession. Finally, when Steratore signaled first down Cowboys, the plug to Dallas’ life support sat firmly entrenched in its socket.
“I’ve never seen that in my life,” Raiders’ linebacker Bruce Irvin said. “He pulled an index card out of his pocket.”
“I haven’t seen that before,” Carr said.
“I just don’t see how they got that,” Raiders’ linebacker Navarro Bowman said. “There was space in between the ball and the stick.”
“Never seen air like that and it somehow turn into a first down,” Del Rio said.
Sure enough, three plays later, Prescott launched a deep ball down the right sideline for Dez Bryant. Until that point, the Cowboys’ top receiver had one catch for 19 yards. The cornerback guarding him, Sean Smith, had two interceptions already on the night.
And sure enough, in the only fitting conclusion to a drive extended by a folded index card, Bryant mounted Smith on a 40yard grab. A minute and 22 seconds later, Dan Bailey hit from 19 yards out for a 20-17 lead.
It was Carr’s time to shine. His time to redeem, at least for one game, every time he flashed a shadow of his 2016 self. His time to validate his $125 million contract, like he has so sparsely since that pay day.
Carr drove the Raiders downfield, resuscitating a dead drive on 4th-and-10 with a prayer to Michael Crabtree. The football gods gifted Oakland with defensive pass interference, one hand on that life support plug and the other ready to yank it loose.
Worst-case scenario now was a Giorgio Tavecchio chip shot to force overtime. Yet when Carr took off, the same Carr who’s rarely used his feet this year, he looked destined to end it in regulation.
Without Michael Crabtree, who sat on the sideline being evaluated for a concussion, Carr took matters into his own hands. Off he went, eyes on the pylon, arm outstretched with his body still several yards short.
“No excuse,” Carr said. “I have to hold onto the ball.”
As the ball trickled off his fingertips and out of the end zone, so too did Oakland’s playoff hopes. Marshawn Lynch exploded, drawing a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, simply a formality further unraveling a Raiders’ season that had already done just that.
Oakland isn’t officially out, but it would take certain four-way ties and a five-way tie to miraculously squeak in. In other words, it’s not happening.
The Raiders, even if they win out, will likely narrowly miss the playoffs.