Breaking down the officiating from the week 18 game between the Broncos and the Chiefs
This game had eight accepted penalties for sixty one penalty yards, alongside a lengthy replay assist and one challenge. This game was not a serious contest for the Kansas City Chiefs, and while the Denver Broncos took it seriously, that was only because the stakes were high for them early. The officials on the other hand had really high stakes, because their post-seasons were on the line even after the Broncos had put the score out of reach.
Challenge Review
Denver made one challenge in the game, a ruling short of the goal on a Michael Burton carry. Much to Tony Romo’s chagrin, Denver was not successful with the challenge. This was a good situation to challenge strategically – the odds that the officials will rule for you on a challenge randomly are not insignificant. Looking at the replay, I think the official on the field got the call correct – it seems more likely to me than not that Burton got the ball approximately too but not to the goal line. However, this was an absurdly close call, and its not one that an official would be crazy for calling the other way (or the replay for calling a touchdown). But I want to highlight one element of this – which is the perspective. I have long been an advocate that the standard to overturn the ruling on the field should depend on the perspective that the camera gives. A camera from the same angle the official had (as this was) should need the highest possible standard of evidence to overturn a call on the field. On the other hand, a camera with an angle fundamentally unique and different from the official perspective should be given much more latitude to overturn the call on the field. This is because officials can only see what they see, and have a responsibility to make a call on every play. When they make a call they aught to be sure of, and were in the perfect position to make, it should be given deference (thus the indisputable evidence standard for replay). However, if they are ruling from a bad angle, and replay can give a good angle, that better angle should not need indisputable evidence, but just more likely than not. All of this is to say that perspective should matter a lot for replay review.
Official Post-Seasons
Playoffs for officials matters a lot. It is a tangible indication of how good others view you at your craft. You get cool experiences, and more money (though the prestige is more important). If you are fortunate enough to get a Super Bowl, you get to be paid to go to the Super Bowl. Its awesome. So for officials the stakes near the end of the season are high. Officials grades sort the full officiating roster into tiers. In recent years, as well as the NFLRA collective bargaining agreement, there have been seemingly four tiers of officials: extremely talented (they work conference championships and the Super Bowl), playoff caliber, not really playoff caliber (they get assigned as alternates but do not work on the field), and not playoff officials. In their first year officiating, and first year as an NFL referee, officials are ineligible for postseason work, so this excludes them. Officials who are judged not playoff officials are viewed as a problem by the NFL, and they have a limited amount of time to improve their performance or be dropped by the league. Also, no official works more than two playoff games, except for Super Bowl officials, who always work divisional round games. So confusingly, the best two officials at each position do not work the conference championships (they are reserved for the Super Bowl and Super Bowl alternate).
Payton/Nix Delay of Game Watch
This game had (only) one play where play clock challenges seriously pushed the Denver offense. Denver called a second quarter timeout due to the play clock situation. While this is an improvement, it is still a bad situation that Nix and Payton need to work on to resolve. Kansas City also had a similar situation later in the game, also costing the Chiefs a timeout.
Official Evaluation
I thought this game was handled relatively well. Its honestly a lot easier to handle a blowout when the team getting blown out does not care, because the chances for fights or escalation is much lower. However, that does not mean the officials were perfect. I marked them with one bad call (a DPI matched up on Sutton), and three questionable calls (a DPI on Riley Moss, a hold by Courtland Sutton, and hold by the Chiefs). There was also a questionable no call on a peel back block that appeared to have the elements of the penalty but only marginally, and it’s a call that is mostly about player safety and this was not particularly violent, so I understood letting it go. The spotting was mostly ok, though there were a few slip ups.
The most noteworthy element of the officiating were the awkward and long pauses for replay assist. This is one area that historically the league has relentlessly pursued improvement in, and it was surprising to see Hochuli and his crew have an extended delay. Not an essential bit from a rules perspective, but not putting the best foot forward.
The NFL does not release grades or tiers for all officials (even internally). Additionally, it is often the case that there are many more extremely talented officials than slots in those prestigious games, making it harder to figure out who the league judged as having an excellent season and who they thought was off. Sometimes, its fairly obvious what is going on. This is because, if everything else is equal, officials will work playoffs with the same crew that they worked the regular season with.
While we will not know the full picture, or the implications of it, until the conference championships are assigned, we can look at Shaun Hochuli and his crew from Week 18 and see how their post-seasons are going. Referee Shawn Hochuil, down Judge Patrick Holt, field judge Jason Ledet and Side judge Jim Quirk are all alternates for the divisional round. Back judge Jimmy Russell and umpire Terry Killens are working on the field (Russell works the Denver game). This is not a great representation, and if none of the alternate officials are assigned on-field games later in the playoffs (officials are allowed one alternate and one on field, but do not necessarily get two assignments), this would be one of the weakest graded crews.
Feel free to ask questions in the comments or to send me an email. While I rarely make unsolicited comments on non-Broncos games, if you have any rules questions from other games I am happy to either reply in the comments or if the matter is of enough concern in next weeks column. Also, you can expect to see a column before the game talking about the officials Denver will see on Sunday.