The Seahawks WR just caught the ball, made a football motion (a turn), and put feet down, as the steelers player hit him and the ball popped loose. Unfortunately the refs blew the whistle for an incomplete pass, blowing the play dead, and unreviewable. In my opinion the refs never get this call right, because on iffy calls like this, both teams should be able to get a reasonable image of what actually happened. The safe call here is to let them play, like in hockey or soccer in a situation like that. when the play is dead, then the team that felt ripped off could officially challenge the play and get a definitive answer. In all reality it didn’t matter in this instance though, as the ball went all the way back to the pittsburgh 10 yard line or thereabouts, and the punt recovery probably gave them better field position.

the blown whistle on the iffy call gets no stars because because the only reason for them to call a play like that dead is for the refs to save face and claim their authority on the field. Nobody likes refs though, and power plays like this don’t help their cause. This hurts both teams in the long run, because that really was a fumble, and by letting the play go through they can look at all the evidence, and not just a quickly-viewed, one sided opinion.