S27. Conference Championships. Tijuana vs Dallas. Hell yeah, I'm still salty! The DSFL never wanted me to win that one, even though it was OUR YEAR! I don't know how much Dallas ended up paying for the victory but god damn was it worth it! I prepped my ass off that week. Knew all their calls, all their plays. The 4th down stop I made was no coincidence. No luck in that play whatsoever! And then all the efforts I made to try and expose the league was COVERED UP! But you know what? They also covered up the plane crash that happened that day, so at least they are thorough in the efforts.
It was this moment that I knew the league was always going to be against me, and it was a huge factor in why I declared my eligibility for the ISFL immediately after. I loved Tijuana way too much to continue being a curse upon their efforts, as shown by them pretty much making the Ultimini every season after.
There have been a good amount of infamous moments in this league directly relating to penalties - so much so that within a month of the sim transfer, we were changing sim rules to accommodate the wicked amount of penalties we were seeing in DSFL games. One particularly memorable moment in Richard Leaking's career came in a game against the Austin Copperheads when Leaking made a game saving tackle on Zoe Watts at the 8 yard line that was nullified by a questionable roughing the passer call on Joseph Joestar - Leaking was absolutely beside himself to have had such an important moment taken away by a call that was ticky tacky on a good day. The Otters would go on to lose the game, and it is a moment that is branded into Leaking's mind for all of eternity. Leaking used this as an instructional moment in practice however; he did not blame his teammate Joestar who, in Leaking's mind, made a good play that was not dirty in the least. He did what any responsible adult would do: he forgave the referee privately, and then publicly blasted him on twitter and sports talk radio.
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It wasn't just one bad call I am upset about this season, it was a whole games worth of bad calls. Early in the year we traveled to New York to play the silverbacks and were bombarded over and over with penalties. Whether it be a hold, an offsides call where they clearly jumped first, nothing that happened that game went our way. The clincher however was a crucial unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that extended a dead drive for the silverbacks and allowed them to make it a two score game late. We had a clean sack on Howitzer on the paly and like any normal team would do, we celebrated a big play that gave us a chance to win the game. However, the referees decided what was a normal celebration dance apparently went a little too far and they threw a flag on us. This flag in my opinion cost us the game but also cost us our season. We just missed the playoffs this year and beating New York would have provided us with the win we needed to get over the hump