NFL fans were up in arms after the league’s officiating crew made several questionable calls on ‘Thursday Night Football.’
During the Philadelphia Eagles’ 26-18 win over the Washington Commanders at Lincoln Financial Field, referees overseeing the NFC East clash missed several blatant face masks on wide receiver DeVonta Smith and quarterback Jalen Hurts. Flags were additionally thrown for phantom pass interference and illegal contact on plays during which seemingly nothing illegal happened.
The officiating got so bad in the second half that even NBC Sports rules analyst Terry McAulay couldn’t refrain from calling out the referees’ mistake. With less than one minute remaining in the third quarter, Smith was spun down to the turf by Commanders linebacker Frankie Luvu, who grabbed hold of the wideout’s helmet opening while attempting to bring him down.
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Though the nearest referee threw a flag immediately after the play was blown dead, ref Adrian Hill announced that there was no flag for a face mask following a conference with his peers on the field. McAulay thought otherwise, however, stating during the broadcast: “If he gets the helmet opening, then that’s just like the face mask and would be a 15-yard penalty … that’s the helmet opening. They should have left the flag down.”
Earlier in the contest, Hurts attempted to flick the ball to a receiver in the end zone while being brought down by several Commanders defenders, but his pass bounced harmlessly off the turf several feet in front of its target. Upon further review, defensive end Dorance Armstrong Jr. clearly wrapped his hand around the signal-caller’s face mask – prompting color commentator Kirk Herbstreit to call out the missed call on air.
“[Hurts is] fighting for his life, they miss the face mask call there. Looks like he got a hold of that but a no-call,” he said as a replay was shown.
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This wouldn’t be the only time that Herbstreit would question a decision made by the referees. On the Commanders’ opening drive of the third half, Eagles defensive back Cooper DeJean was called for defensive pass interference after grabbing onto wide receiver Noah Brown’s undershirt for a split second.
Yet Herbstreit didn’t believe the small tug was deserving of a penalty, insisting that DeJean’s swipe of Brown “didn’t really slow him down at all.” Al Michaels expressed a similar sentiment, chiming in: “No, oh boy…”
An illegal contact penalty assessed to Commanders cornerback Mike Sainristil in the final two minutes of the second quarter additionally drew a fierce reaction from viewers, who insisted that there was no need to throw a flag.
Taking to social media, droves of critics slammed the NFL for the egregious errors made by the referees on Thursday – in particular the series of missed face mask calls. “Every single person watching TV and every single person in the stadium watching the Jumbotron can clearly see that was a facemask. Meanwhile, the refs are talking amongst themselves without any additional information than what they saw live, now THAT’S a broken system,” one X user wrote.
Another added: “300 different camera angles of every primetime football game, many with super zoom technology, and we still can’t get facemasks right. Picking up that flag on the facemask on DeVonta Smith was rugged. Like someone in the NFL replay center called and said ‘y’know what? —- em.’”
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