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It Was Another Disastrous Sunday for NFL Referees

Also in Traina Thoughts: CBS’s ridiculous Taylor Swift coverage; Pat McAfee makes bold statement about ‘College GameDay’ future; Stephen A. Smith’s best take; and more.

Jimmy Traina

1. I kicked off last Monday’s “Traina Thoughts” with an item about how bad the NFL officiating was in Week 6. Well, guess what? It was even worse in Week 7.

The officiating in the NFL has always been suspect, but it’s a full-blown problem now, no matter how much the league wants to ignore it.

Refs are going to miss calls. That’s part of the gig. Nobody is perfect. But the outcomes of games are being determined by the officials, and that’s a major, major issue.

The only reasonable solution I can offer at this time is that every single play should be allowed to be reviewed inside of two minutes. Something needs to be done to prevent the outcome of a game being decided by refs.

Here are two examples from Sunday.

The Steelers lead the Rams, 24–17, with 2:24 remaining facing a fourth-and-1. Pittsburgh quarterback Kenny Pickett runs a sneak and comes up short, yet the refs give him a first down to end the game.

The Rams deserved to lose this game, and coach Sean McVay had a huge hand in the team’s defeat because he left himself with no timeouts at this point in the game, so he couldn’t challenge the spot. But the call was just so bad and so egregious that you have to wonder what exactly the refs were looking at.

Example No. 2 comes from the Browns’ wild 39–38 win over the Colts. The refs bailed out Cleveland not once, but twice in this one. 

After Indianapolis recovered a fumble with under a minute left to seal what would’ve been a 38–33 win, refs called a phantom illegal contact penalty to negate the turnover.

As if that wasn’t enough, the refs then called a pass interference penalty on a ball that was completely uncatchable.

Of course, that put the ball at the 1-yard line, and and Browns running back Kareem Hunt scored with 19 seconds left to give Cleveland the 39–38 win.

There were other officiating issues around the league. In the Miami-Philadelphia game, the Dolphins were called for 10 penalties, and the Eagles were called for zero.

Patriots coach Bill Belichick called the officiating in his team’s win over the Bills “unusual.”

The NFL would never publicly admit that it has an officiating problem, but you have to hope the league is at least discussing the problem internally and trying to come up with some sort of solution because as we get later in the season, more important games are doing to be determined by the people wearing striped shirts and blowing whistles and not the 22 men actually playing the game.

2. I said NBC embarrassed itself with its Taylor Swift coverage in Week 4 when the Chiefs played the Jets on Sunday Night Football. So in the interest of fairness, let me say that CBS embarrassed itself Sunday with its Taylor Swift coverage during Chargers-Chiefs. Just incessant, over the top and flat-out stupid. 

3. This was one hell of a statement by Pat McAfee over the weekend.

“It’s one of the biggest reasons why I have not resigned a contract with the legendary show. I’m not right for some crowds and the ‘distinguished’ College Football folks are definitely one of those.”

If you’re McAfee and you’ve had the kind of success he’s had and you’re making the money he's making, you really shouldn’t worry about a poll taken by a website. Having said that, I respect McAfee’s honesty in admitting that he may leave ESPN College GameDay because of negative fan reactions. Few people would be that transparent.

4. Just looking for some sympathy here from my fellow degenerate gamblers. I bet over 16.5 points for the Giants on Sunday. They had 14 points by halftime. You'd think it’s an easy win. Think again. They finished with 14 points. The devastating blow that still has me reeling came late in the fourth quarter, when this happened.

5. I had never heard of the CW show FBOY Island, but thanks to a fire promo from the network's college football play-by-play broadcaster, James Bates, I’m ready to binge.

6. This week’s SI Media With Jimmy Traina features a conversation with the founder and CEO of The Ringer, Bill Simmons.

Topics discussed include why Simmons doesn’t do a lot of interviews, the state of sports media, what makes someone a good podcaster, how he preps for a podcast, how he remembers his time at ESPN, whether he regrets calling Roger Goodell a “liar,” getting suspended from Twitter, his issue with how people aggregate his podcast and the ESPN NBA Countdown vs. TNT’s Inside the NBA battle.

Other topics covered include the NBA and MLB broadcaster problem, the way gambling has taken over everything in sports, his upcoming Vince McMahon Netflix documentary and much, much more.

Following Simmons, Sal Licata from WFAN radio and SNY TV in New York joins me for our weekly “Traina Thoughts” segment. This week, Jimmy and Sal discuss Twitter charging $1 a year to use the service, the reaction to the viral Chargers fan from Monday Night Football, whether the Buccaneers’ creamsicle uniforms are the best in sports and upcoming NFL schedule items. Plus, we answer listener questions.

You can listen to the podcast below or download it on Apple, Spotify and Google.

You can also watch SI Media With Jimmy Traina on YouTube.

7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: Stephen A. Smith has unloaded millions of takes during his career. This might be his very best. All hail the Cheesecake Factory!

Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out SI Media With Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok.

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Jimmy Traina
JIMMY TRAINA

Jimmy Traina is a staff writer and podcast host for Sports Illustrated. A 20-year veteran in the industry, he’s been covering the sports media landscape for seven years and writes a daily column, Traina Thoughts. Traina has hosted the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast since 2018, a show known for interviews with some of the most important and powerful people in sports media. He also was the creator and writer of SI’s Hot Clicks feature from 2007 to '13.

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