FanPulse Week 8: Confidence remains high with Colts’ success; NFL fans have lost all trust in officials

Welcome to SB Nation FanPulse, a survey of fans across the NFL powered by SurveyMonkey. As the season kicks off in just a few weeks, each week, we’ll send 32 polls to 100+ plugged in fans from each team. Colts fans, sign up HERE to join FanPulse.

We’re back with our weekly FanPulse survey this week, and for the Week 8 set of questions, there are two national surveys to discuss.

Aside from the weekly question in regards to fan confidence in the team, the community has been asked if NFL games are being officiated fairly, as well as what the best football movie of all time is.

Let’s get started with the Colts, and the confidence level their fans have in the franchise.

At the moment the Indianapolis Colts are in the process of preparing host the Denver Broncos on the heels of consecutive huge wins. The Colts shocked most onlookers with their victory over the Kansas City Chiefs, but they then followed that up with a huge divisional win over the Houston Texans at Lucas Oil Stadium after their bye week.

Colts fans have only truly wavered in their confidence once this season which came after their loss to the Oakland Raiders, but that loss doesn’t look quite as bad as it originally did, and the team has been excellent ever since.

Right now, fans are up from their 91 percent confidence level from a week ago to 96 percent this week which is the highest number of the season, and the second-highest mark only behind the end of last season, and the post-draft number, both of which were at 98 percent.

Following their Week 7 win over the Texans, Colts fans are showing that they believe in the team to continue their upward trend as they head into a very favorable portion of their schedule. Over the next four weeks, the Colts combined opponent’s record is 7-19, and the Colts currently sit atop the AFC South as well.

The team looks to be controlling their own fate at the moment, and with wins in each of their next four games they can really take hold of the division, but playing down to their competition won’t sit well with the fan base either. Colts’ fans want to see some domination, and without it — win or lose — fans may retaliate in upcoming surveys.

Now on to our two national questions. First, we look at the league’s officiating.

It’s no secret that players, teams and fans alike are sick and tired of ticky-tack calls in the way of personal foul penalties, phantom penalties, and the league’s massive failure in the review process especially with pass interference penalties.

Additionally, there have been several games in which we’re seeing flags thrown on multiple consecutive plays, truly making some games unwatchable due to the officiating crew on the field.

The first of this week’s two national questions asks “are you confident that NFL games are officiated fairly?”

I feel like this question may have been misinterpreted to be perfectly honest. I read this question as a debate on whether the crews were picking their favorites, favoring one team versus the other. Maybe not, but that is clearly not what fans were thinking when responding this question.

With that, we’ll continue as if the question was “are NFL games being officiated terribly, without any consistency, and as if none of the crews have a clue what they are doing?”

As you can clearly see, fans are not happy with how games are being called right now. Several, including former Colts’ punter Pat McAfee, have stated that this year closely resembles that of replacement officials. That is not good, and nobody who’s said that would be wrong.

The officials have been historically bad, there is no sense of a collective knowledge of how reviews are supposed to be conducted, the crews down right refuse to overturn obviously bad calls, and it seems as if the rules change not just on a weekly basis, but a game-to-game basis on Sundays.

Fans are sick of it, the media, players and teams as a whole are sick of it, and the league is missing a huge opportunity to do something about it before it turns fans away yet they continue to stay the course and do nothing to a truly awful product right now. It’s a shame, and Roger Goodell could use the positive publicity, however, he’s failed to take advantage of that chance thus far.

Now for our second national question: What’s the best football movie of all time?

For the most part, the results of this question may have a decent amount to do with the reader’s youth, and what sort of movie genre they’re most interested in. I am definitely in the minority here as I chose The Program, although this week’s winner did come in a close second place for me.

I was a little surprised that Friday Night Lights didn’t do better being that it had a television series produced after its success on the big screen. Clearly, those taking part in the survey enjoy a more emotional, dramatic, and sign-of-the-times movie in this category.

The winner, Remember the Titans (35% of the total votes), was an excellent movie touching on the most controversial issue of 1971 which the flick is largely based on — the integration of an all-black school with an all-white school in Alexandria, Virginia.

When all of the students, through trials and tribulations, rise above prejudices to become a family and win football games, it’s hard not to fall in love with the story as well as the result. Regardless of whether Remember the Titans is the best football movie of all time, it was without question one of the best movies ever made and the results of this survey suggest that as well.

Rudy came in a distant second place with less than 16 percent of the votes, and Any Given Sunday followed close behind with 13 percent of the votes. “Other” did get a significant amount of votes, and curiosity has gotten the best of me. Please tell me it wasn’t Varsity Blues! However, if you were in the “other” category, comment below and give us your pick.