Kudos to NFC West colleague Mike Sando for eliciting a rare admission from the NFL regarding a call we discussed in our earlier Dirty Laundry post.
As you recall, referee Mike Carey's crew spotted the ball five yards away from where the San Francisco 49ers' Ted Ginn went out of bounds at the end of a critical punt return in the fourth quarter of the Detroit Lions' 25-19 loss.
Here is the NFL's statement: "The officiating crew incorrectly spotted the ball at the Detroit 35 instead of the 40 where Ted Ginn went out of bounds."
So there you go. I'm not sure that spot was the difference in the game, but it did put the 49ers five yards closer to their eventual game-winning touchdown.
The league didn't comment on the pair of possible illegal blocks that occurred on the play, which is not unusual. Those calls are subjective. Marking the line of scrimmage is an objective exercise, and it was simply a mistake.