I just got home form Steinway and it's my opinion that this is the only post in this thread that properly assigns the blame for what happened.
There WAS an attending ref, sitting about two feet from Jayson Shaw, and for him not to know what ball was called by Earl is an outrage.
After an unsuccessful attempt to verify what ball was called reviewing the audio, Head Referee and tournament director John Leyman, one of the best in the business, made the only call that he could make in the absence of any truly conclusive evidence that Earl called the wrong ball.
It needs to be noted that earlier in this same match, Earl called the wrong ball and though he pocketed the shot that he attempted, he lost the table when Jayson pointed it out. To me, that makes it far more likely that Earl called the wrong ball here, repeating the mistake, but, of course, it is inconclusive.
To believe that Earl made the right call here would require believing that Jayson Shaw imagined the call of the two, as did a couple of very trustworthy onlookers to whom I spoke. That's a little too unlikely a scenario for my taste, and I think it highly likely that the wrong ball was called by Earl.
Shaw a victim or a defeated foe? I say victim, but the perpetrator was the attending ref, who got caught napping and whose nap likely cost Jayson the match.
The match left such a bad taste in my mouth that I left rather than staying for Immonen vs Lo Li Wen, which will determine the other finalist.
Can't give you green, but well said.