Santonio Holmes Super Bowl Catch: Did He Have One Foot in Or Two?

by Jon Azpiri | February 5, 2009 at 11:44 am
13759 views | 0 Recommendations | 13 comments

It's been nearly a week since the Super Bowl, but the controversy surrounding Santonio Holmes game-winning catch has yet to die down.

Football fans of all stripes have taken to analyzing footage of the catch as if it were the Zapruder film and have come up with different conclusions.

This photo shows that perhaps Holmes had one foot inbounds when he caught the ball in the end zone.

Meanwhile, a Pittsburgh blogger has photos that show that Holmes did, in fact, plant both feet.

Like the Zapruder film itself, it appears that people see what they want to see in the Santonio Holmes touchdown photos. It should be noted, however, that the photos of Holmes with one foot inbounds are hardly conclusive since Holmes could have gotten his second foot down before or after the photo was snapped.

Regardless, the touchdown still counts and the Steelers are Super Bowl champs. As for Holmes, he's seem to have moved on. He spent Tuesday at Disney World.

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5
Mike G.

You have got to be kidding me.  There are tons of photos and you could clearly see that Holmes had both feet down.  Let it go already.  It was great catch and let it at that.  The Cards played a great game but when it came down to it they lost plain and simple.  Please stop whinning.

0
Jon Azpiri

Here are another great set of closeup photos of the Holmes catch.

3
Ronnie Honduras

What a joke.  Selective picture.  Why not take a shot of him sitting outside of the end zone and use that as evidence.  Amazing how pathetic folks are about this. Get over it.

1
Chris F

I personally think that people need to let this go.  There are photos out there that clearly show that both of his feet were down.  People need to stop trying to stir up controversy by taking away a solid win by the steelers.  It was a catch...100%.  If it had been called the opposite, Pittsburgh was well within field goal range to tie the game, and had another down to try for 6, so you can't say that if he hadn't have caught that the cards would have won for sure. 

1
Jake F.

The simple fact remains is that IF the play calling was smart, the Steelers would have never had the opportunity to score again.  Reminds me of Montana driving the 49ers down the field starting with 3:20 left in the game.  They left 34 seconds and Cincy was not going to score.

Fast forward to Arizona scoring too fast.  Considering the defense scheme Pittsburgh was running, they could have easily burned more time off the clock.


BTW.. Holmes DID catch the ball. Holmes had posession of the ball BEFORE the defender placed a hand on him.  From the following 2 links to pictures, you can see when he caught the ball. 

1st picture: Holmes has possession of the ball before Francisco touches him:  At this point, it appears that his right toe doesn't touch yet.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/NBCSports/Sections/Personal/Williams,%20Ed/Photos/090202_Holmes.ss_full.jpg


2nd picture:  Holmes has BOTH feet down as Francisco starts to push him out of bounds. While you can't see the ball clearly, this is after the 1st picture was taken. 

http://my.thescore.com/scoreblog/archive/2009/02/05/santonio-holmes-got-his-feet-down-as-if-we-didn-t-already-know.aspx

And a couple of closeups.  If you look at the picture on the top of the page, it is simply a closeup of the msnbc picture.  (see the bottom of Moore's spikes for reference)

http://www.steelersdepot.com/blog/2009/02/picture-of-santonio-holmes-with-2-two-feet-down-for-touchdown/

At NO point did Holmes bobble the ball.  Discussion is over.

And, no, I am NOT a Steelers fan.

0
Jake Frost

The simple fact remains is that IF the play calling was smart, the Steelers would have never had the opportunity to score again.  Reminds me of Montana driving the 49ers down the field starting with 3:20 left in the game.  They left 34 seconds and Cincy was not going to score.

Fast forward to Arizona scoring too fast.  Considering the defense scheme Pittsburgh was running, they could have easily burned more time off the clock.


BTW.. Holmes DID catch the ball. Holmes had possession of the ball BEFORE the defender placed a hand on him.  From the following 2 links to pictures, you can see when he caught the ball. 

1st picture: Holmes has possession of the ball before Francisco touches him:  At this point, it appears that his right toe doesn't touch yet.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/NBCSports/Sections/Personal/Williams,%20Ed/Photos/090202_Holmes.ss_full.jpg


2nd picture:  Holmes has BOTH feet down as Francisco starts to push him out of bounds. While you can't see the ball clearly, this is after the 1st picture was taken. 

http://my.thescore.com/scoreblog/archive/2009/02/05/santonio-holmes-got-his-feet-down-as-if-we-didn-t-already-know.aspx

And a couple of closeups.  If you look at the picture on the top of the page, it is simply a closeup of the msnbc picture.  (see the bottom of Moore's spikes for reference)

http://www.steelersdepot.com/blog/2009/02/picture-of-santonio-holmes-with-2-two-feet-down-for-touchdown/

At NO point did Holmes bobble the ball.  Discussion is over.

And, no, I am NOT a Steelers fan.

1
Jon Azpiri

Peter King's column in SI confirms that NFL officials looked carefully at the tape and made the right call.

Holmes had missed the previous throw. Not this one. Leaning over the white boundary stripe, five feet shy of the end line, Holmes snatched the high ball out of the air and got what -- one, two feet down? The Ultra Slow-Motion camera at NBC director Fred Gaudelli's disposal (the network had three of these artsy cameras in use, two low at either end zone, and one on the 50) dispelled all doubt that Holmes got his right foot down. No way referee Terry McAulay would have been able to overturn the call anyway, but Ultra Slow-Mo assured that the Steelers had their touchdown -- and Roethlisberger his drive for the ages.


1
Zippy Zip

AHAHAHAHAHAHA.  Let it go, just let it go.  Let's say your conspiracy theory were true (and it's most definitely not).  You think the Steelers wouldn't have scored on third or fourth down? 

1
StlrFan10

Ok this site sucks becuase he had complete possession of the ball before this photo was taken. Look closer at the total control and at that time look at the feet and learn football please it doesnt take a football player to see what is going on here. GO STEELERS KEEP IT UP FOR EVER EVEN WHEN THEY HATIN

1
Juwan

He had 2 feet down dummy!!!! LOOK

<a href="http://imageshack.us"><img src="http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/8283/2ftzoomfe2.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosted by ImageShack.us"/></a><br/><a href="http://g.imageshack.us/img134/2ftzoomfe2.jpg/1/"><img src="http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/2ftzoomfe2.jpg/1/w500.png" border="0"></a>

1
TXFLH

The closeup photo in this video is taken just after Holmes has possession.  If you capture the moment he has control, both feet are down, then he tilts forward and the back foot comes up.  This can be verified by the position of the Cardinal defender.  CASE CLOSED

0
L****r

I don't care if he had both feet in our not it was one hell of a catch so me as both a ref and a coach after seeing what took place I would deff give him the catch, so stop talking about this and let it go, both teams played on hell of a game END OF Story

1
brandon daniel

probably on of the biggest blown calls of the game! That stupid shit only had one foot in, look at the damn videos and photos, you cant even argue it! The refs really wanted to get the steelers their 5th and 6th super bowl huh? two of the worst called games in the super bowl included the steelers.

ONE FOOT!!

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