If you watch a lot of NFL broadcasts like I do, you’ve probably noticed there’s a certain way broadcasters usually talk about the referees. They rarely criticize them directly, even when they seem wrong. Some aren't even allowed to as part of their contracts. Instead, each network has a rules official they bring in to talk about any close calls, and more often than not, the rules official either openly sides with the refs or, if they’re very clearly in the wrong, makes excuses about how the angles were complicated or it was a split second decision. Let the record show none of that happened during the Chiefs and Texans Divisional Playoff Game yesterday.
In addition to winning the last two Super Bowls and three of the last five, the Kansas City Chiefs have also acquired a reputation amongst NFL fans for being the beneficiaries of some generous officiating. That was the case again during their game with the Texans when the Chiefs and quarterback Patrick Mahomes benefited from not one but two very questionable roughing the passer calls. The first one came for an alleged blow to the helmet on a key third down play after Mahomes missed a wide open Travis Kelce, only all the subsequent replays showed there wasn’t any contact to the helmet.
The second one came during a quarterback run in which Mahomes waited forever to slide, resulting in two Texan defenders running into each other and making some minor contact with him while he was on the ground. Once again, roughing the passer was called, and the Chiefs were given fifteen yards and a free first down. At that point, announcers Troy Aikman and Joe Buck started openly questioning the officials. A frustrated Aikman, who is usually pretty open about the players, audibly said, “Oh come on!” while the ref was announcing the call, and he later got even more aggressive while watching a replay.
Oh come on! He’s a runner, and I could not disagree with that one more. He barely gets hit. That’s the second penalty now that’s been called against the Texans… They’ve gotta address this in the offseason. You can’t, as a quarterback, run around and play games with defenders and be able to draw a penalty.
ESPN’s rules official Russell Yurk, who used to be the Vice President who oversaw officiating for the NFL itself, also very directly said on the broadcast it should not have been called, and Joe Buck chimed in as well, calling it a “late slide” and saying the official who called the penalty was “behind the play”, which is a friendly way of saying he had a bad angle.
Later in the game, there was also a third play in which Mahomes appeared to slow down just long enough before going out of bounds so the defender was able to catch up to him and shove him out. When he did, Mahomes flailed his arms in the air and went down like he’d been blindsided by a car. The refs didn't throw a flag, but once again, Aikman did not hold back with his thoughts. He directly accused Mahomes of trying to draw a penalty and said he sees why defensive players are frustrated with him personally.
He’s trying to draw the penalty. You see that rather than run out of bounds, he slows down. That’s been the frustration, and I get it. That’s been the frustration for these defensive players around the league.
Now, if you don’t watch a ton of NFL broadcasts, you might be a little confused. It’s not as if Buck, Aikman or Yurk were that aggressive with their comments, but compared to what we normally here, this is super aggressive. We have all watched numerous NFL games in which the officials have very blatantly screwed something up, and all we get from the broadcast is something like, “well, it was a bang bang play.” Sometimes the rules official even comes on and lies to all of our faces, acting like whatever happened was a textbook call by the official.
Many fans were elated to hear such direct criticism, especially in a key playoff game. Awful Announcing reposted two full videos with pull quotes from the announcers comments. Warren Sharp, who does NFL analytics and has a ton of followers, tweeted his “compliments” to the announcers for being so direct, and his tweet has more than 50,000 likes. Check it out…
taking a second to compliment Aikman and Buck for not being afraid to criticize horrible refs making horrible calls on national tvnormalize this and we might fix itJanuary 19, 2025
Those tweets were far from the only ones addressing the matter either. Another tweet complimented how good Aikman has gotten since he started saying “whatever the hell he thinks.” That got more than 40,000 likes. Another calling him the best analyst in the NFL got more than 10,000 likes. One calling him and Buck the gold standard of broadcasters got more than 7500 likes.
There are times in which football fans point to the officials to make excuses for why their team didn’t win. That’s been happening since the dawn of sports, and it’ll continue happening as long as new games are happening. In general, I’m not looking for officials to go out of their way to run down the refs or nitpick every single close call. That’s not healthy, and in my opinion, some of the criticism the Chiefs have gotten over the years for friendly refereeing has been just as unfounded as the hate they've gotten for Taylor Swift being shown during broadcasts. They’ve been the best team in football for awhile, and if you think that’s just ref driven, you probably also wrongly think the Swift hype train is just media driven.
But football fans also aren’t stupid. Many of us watch multiple games every single week. We know what the rules are and how they’re supposed to be interpreted. So, if the officials get that wrong in an obvious way, the announcers should talk about that. Aikman and Buck did, and it’s why I agree with so many fans that they’re the best in the game.
