Seahawks escape with victory over Lions

But, in a game in which the Lions reached the red zone just once, one more yard from Johnson would’ve given them a probable victory.

Seattle has not allowed an offensive touchdown in the two games since Chancellor ended his holdout over a contractual dispute, and has forced 18 punts during that stretch.

According to the National Football League rulebook, an illegal bat occurs if “any player bats or punches a loose ball (that has touched the ground) in any direction, if it is in either end zone”.

Said Chancellor: “I don’t know anything about the rule, and I didn’t see what happened”.

Wide receiver Golden Tate #81 of the Seattle Seahawks makes a catch in the end zone to defeat the Green Bay Packers on a controversial call by the officials at CenturyLink Field on September 24, 2012 in Seattle, Washington.

ALLEN PARK Not only did the Lions lose at Seattle on Monday night, they lost at least one player for the remainder of the season.

NOTES: Seattle RB Marshawn Lynch, who injured a hamstring last week against Chicago, was inactive Monday.

“It is a questionable play because it was a batted ball, but that goes upstairs [for review] so there’s nothing you can do about it”, Lions coach Jim Caldwell told reporters. He made numerous escapes from virtually unblocked rushers, but fumbled with under nine minutes left, and the Detroit defense scooped up the ball and went 27 yards for the score.

The ball should have been placed half the distance to the goal from the spot of the fumble and Detroit should have had an automatic first down. However, pointing to a 90-yard drive that stopped at the 1-yard line late in the game, the Lions remain optimistic they can turn things around. Whether the back judge wants to say he didn’t think it was an overt act or not, it was clear to everybody watching that it was an intentional bat of the ball. With Detroit out of timeouts, the Seahawks (2-2) ran off the final seconds of their second straight win.

The Seattle Seahawks may have saved their season with a huge play by their All-Pro safety Kam Chancellor, but the play was not without controversy as the Detroit Lions should have been given a second chance.

However, Seattle’s defense stood up. “The protection; we didn’t run the ball as well as we wanted tonight and we obviously had trouble protecting”, Carroll said.

“It’s a number of different things”, Caldwell said.

The Seattle Seahawks managed to avoid an upset by the Detroit Lions, winning 13-10 Monday night thanks in part to a call that will likely be argued all week and possibly all season.

‘”I’ve got to just catch the ball next time instead of illegally batting it”, he said.

But in the end, Free Press columnist Drew Sharp writes that the Lions really have themselves to blame for the loss. Hauschka hit field goals of 51 and 52 yards, becoming the first Seattle kicker to hit two 50-yarders in the same game since Josh Brown in 2007.

“It’s still a hard call, even knowing the rule”, Carroll said.