Feb. 6 (UPI) — Former NFL vice president of officiating Mike Pereira doesn’t agree with fans who think the league is conspiring to help the Kansas City Chiefs, but wishes quarterback Patrick Mahomes was penalized for flopping.
Pereira and fellow former vice president of officiating Dean Blandino, who both now work as rules analysts for Fox Sports, spoke to UPI on Thursday.
“I think that if anybody got a chance to be an official in the NFL, they would know that there is nothing to the [conspiracy] story,” Pereira said at the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center.
“I understand it because numbers kind of show it and the iffy calls have kinda gone the Chiefs way, but in reality, officials are only trying to do one thing: Make the right call.”
Conspiracy theories gained steam throughout the Chiefs’ dynastic run, which could extend with an unprecedented third-consecutive Super Bowl victory when they face the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday at Caesars Superdome. During that run, the Chiefs were called for fewer penalties than their opponents in 16 of 20 playoff games — including each of their last 12 — in the Mahomes era, which started in 2019.
The Chiefs were penalized 41 times for 341 yards over their last 12 games, compared to 72 penalties for 589 yards for their foes. Mahomes said this postseason that he doesn’t believe the Chiefs get more favorable calls than their foes, but admitted to a flop against the Houston Texans in the divisional round.
Many of the most talked about Chiefs-related calls have involved Mahomes, who often extends plays with runs up the sidelines, sometimes embellishing hits at the end of those plays to earn penalties and extra yardage.
“Flops usually have one difference from regular play,” Pereira said. “It’s a delayed action. If there is a push, then a down, you can read that a little bit. But the game is about deceit, right? There are all kinds of fakes, play action passes where you fake. … Most of the time, you can decipher if it’s a flop or not, but it’s no guarantee.
“I wish we could do something, but you can’t give them a technical foul. Maybe an unfair act [penalty], maybe we could do that.”
Blandino said officials study film on the teams they referee, similar to the way the teams analyze each other, before they work games. He also conceded that it is still most difficult to officiate quarterbacks who like to run, including Mahomes.
“Any mobile quarterback is always going to be more difficult to officiate,” Blandino said. “The guys like Tom Brady and Peyton Manning who stayed in the pocket and knew when to get rid of the football, those were easier, but the mobile quarterbacks, we’ve got two in this game, they are tougher.
“Mahomes has been really good. There are other guys that come to mind, but when you think about the numbers, the last three or four years, Mahomes is probably middle of the road in terms of the number of calls he has gotten. He has done a good job of pushing that envelope, especially on the sideline. Officials just have to be aware of it.”
Pereira said he was “sad that it’s a story,” when asked about the Chiefs conspiracy narrative. On Monday, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell called the notion “a ridiculous theory.” The NFL Referees Association aligned with Goodell on Tuesday.
“Commissioner Goodell’s comments that it is ‘ridiculous’ to presume that NFL officials are not doing everything possible to make the right call on every play is spot on,” NFLRA executive director Scott Green said.
“Officiating crews do not work the same team more than twice each regular season. It is insulting and preposterous to hear conspiracy theories that somehow 17 officiating crews consisting of 138 officials are colluding to assist one team.”
NFL officials receive weekly grades for every single play of each game they work. Those grades help determine postseason assignments. Veteran Ron Tolbert will be the head referee for Sunday’s game, with Boris Cheek, Mike Morton, Max Causey, Mark Stewart, Mearl Robinson, Jonah Monroe and Kevin Brown also on the crew.
“The key for a game like this is, ‘let’s call the fouls that we have to call, not the ones that maybe we could, the ticky-tack ones,'” Blandino said. “I think they will do a good job and I’m excited for the game.”
Blandino said he believes the league will review the fake slide, where quarterbacks pretend they are about to give themselves up and end a play, but keep running. He also thinks more transparency from the NFL, including potentially allowing fans to hear referee conversations, could improve fan perception and dispel conspiracies.
“I’m not sure what the answer is, but I know they are going to look at it and look at a lot of film,” Blandino said. “I just don’t think they are going to be able to come to a consensus on what do you do if you take that away. What does a player do then to give themselves up?”
Hall of fame defensive back Charles Woodson and defensive end Michael Strahan agreed that quarterbacks get much more referee favoritism now than they did years ago. But Woodson said defenders shouldn’t temper aggression, despite often being on the wrong end of referee decisions.
“Keep hitting them,” Woodson told UPI. “It don’t matter. Keep hitting them. The problem I see a lot of times is that guys pull up when he gets to the sideline. Don’t slow down. If he slows down, you just keep running. He puts guys to sleep a lot of times around that 3 of 4 yards before he gets out of bounds. If you slow down, he is going to run up the sideline and it’s going to be your fault.
“Full speed ahead. If he is still in bounds inside the white lines, let it go.”
Strahan believes fake slides should be penalized by a 15-yard penalty, the same punishment for a roughing the passer infraction.
“I see some other quarterbacks who are allowed to get hit,” Strahan said. “The system is set up to keep the quarterback healthy and I get that 100% because the league is about scoring points. Scoring points adds viewers. But when you are a player and you are competing, you are competing to win.
“The last thing you want is for something like that, some little hiccup like that to change the outcome of the game.”
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