BLAST MAHOMES AS A CRYBABY, BUT THE NFL OFFICIALS KEEP RUINING GAMES

The Chiefs blew an epic touchdown when Kadarius Toney was offside, but the two-time MVP raged with other players about zebra ineptness when full-timers could be hired with $120 billion in media money

     Wherever a competent game official is located, either via artificial intelligence or a sports-sniffing Supreme Court, the NFL should respond. A league immersed in gambling cannot send bettors on weekly emotional breakdowns, nor can it invite Patrick Mahomes to crush every zebra into shreds. Taylor Swift is ensconced with Travis Kelce, asking how a down judge named Mike Carr makes her bad-boy lyrics.

     Taylor’s Version (and mine): A league of optimum financial value, the lead player in American entertainment, cannot allow officials to serve as a software assurance representative, a rancher, a banker, a sales manager, a non-profit CEO, an attorney, a building official, a tax-rat dude, an aerospace type, an insurance fellow, a money advisor, an inventory monitor, a college professor, a certified public accountant, an athletic director, a high-school administrator, a firefighter, a real estate agent, a pharmaceutical worker and something to do with agribusiness, which is the very soil of our current game action.

     With $120 billion arriving in media money, there is no excuse for Roger Goodell to let zebras dominate discussions as the postseason nears. He should use some of that wealth to hire dozens of healthy people as full-time employees and ditch their real jobs, allowing them to spend months preventing problems that mess up September through February. For years, the commissioner has shrugged off a too-common problem, making a mockery of officials at an owners meeting.

     “Officiating is always a focus for us. I joke, but I’m not joking: I’m (past) 40 years in the league, and I think there’s always a two- or three-week period where there’s an intense focus on it,” Goodell said. “But, listen, you never want to see a game where people are talking about officials afterwards.”

     The dialogue is happening every week. It percolates through the actions of Mahomes, the league’s well-regarded public face, who is so distracted by officials that his rage is preventing the Kansas City Chiefs from repeating as Super Bowl champions. Last week, a flagrant pass-interference penalty was ignored against Green Bay defender Carrington Valentine, which contributed to a 27-19 defeat in which Kelce was roughed up on a game-ending Hail Mary attempt. Or, the Chiefs could employ receivers — how’s life in Miami, Tyreek Hill? — who haven’t dropped 26 balls this season. Marquez Valdes-Scantling clanked a game-winner in a loss to Philadelphia. Skyy Moore missed a touchdown pass in a loss to Denver.

     And on Sunday in Kansas City, where Swift returned to Arrowhead Stadium, Kadarius Toney made an egregious mistake in football history. In what could have been a romantic musical swirl, Kelce was swarmed by three Buffalo defenders and threw a luscious lateral pass to Toney, who finished a 49-yard trot to the end zone. The play was an all-timer … until Carr realized Toney lined up offside. Yes, he did, which Mahomes acknowledged in saying receivers are warned before given an offside penalty. Is that true? They’re warned by officials? After losing his mind, throwing his helmet and asking three officials to explain what happened — to no avail — the two-time MVP remained livid afterward.

     “It’s tough to swallow,” Mahomes said. “Not only from me, and football in general, to take away greatness like that, for a guy like Travis to make a play like that, you want to see the guys on the field decide the game. They’re human. They make mistakes. But every week, we’re talking about something. It’s the call. Just in that moment. Not for myself. To have a flag change the outcome of the game. I’ve never had offensive offsides called.”

     Oh, Toney’s foot was over the line, as referee Carl Cheffers pointed out to a pool reporter. “Ultimately, they are responsible for wherever they line up,” he said. “No warning is required, especially if they are lined up so far offsides where they're actually blocking our view of the ball. We would give them a warning if it was anywhere close, but this particular one is beyond a warning.”

     So the officials would give the receiver a warning. That’s a lapse of integrity. Whether you think the Chiefs are crybabies — and they are — they’re also victims of Goodell’s so-called absent “focus.” If officials were more consistent, the champs wouldn’t be reduced to 8-5 after a 20-17 loss. “I’ve played seven years, never has an offensive offside called. That's elementary school (stuff) we're talking about,” Mahomes said. “There was no warning throughout the entire game. Then you wait until there's a minute left in the game to make a call like that? It's tough. Lost for words. It's tough. Regardless if we win or lose, just the end of another game and we're talking about the refs. It's just not what we want for the NFL and for football.

     “What you want as a competitor is you practice all week to go out there and try to win, and you want it to be about your team and that team and see what happens. You don't want to be talking about this stuff after the game. I want to go out there and play and then see what happens at the end, see what the score is, and then I can live with the results.’’

     Same goes for the fans — gamblers and otherwise. The league is suffering from wayward offensive performances, and while Toney should back up a few inches, losing a sweetheart performance hurts the product. “It’s a bit embarrassing for the National Football League for that to take place,” said Andy Reid, the understated Chiefs coach. “For a guy like Travis to make a play like that ... who knows if we win, but I know as fans you want to see the guys on the field decide the game, and that's why last week I didn't say anything about the flag. They didn't make the call (in Green Bay). They're human. They make mistakes. But every week we're talking about something.’’

     The losers weren’t the only ones griping. Two of the league’s premier defensive players were as loud. “The officiating was a travesty today. It was honestly awful,” said Cleveland’s Myles Garrett, who said his shoulder was “scratched by a couple of wild feral cats” on the Jacksonville defense. The Browns improved to 8-5 behind veteran quarterback Joe Flacco, who is a better idea than the $230-million misfit Deshaun Watson. Garrett was angry, saying, “They need to be under the same microscope that we are on every single play.”

     Micah Parsons didn’t let a rout of Philadelphia deter his bad mood. When a play was posted online in which Eagles tight end Dallas Goedert held Parsons’ jersey without a call, the linebacker replied, “I told you it’s comical!” He continued: “It’s something that we should not even call out anymore. We all see what’s going on. We don’t got to say it. The fans, the media, the reporters, they all see it. It’s just something they won’t make an emphasis on. And you know, they’re getting away and they want teams to score lots of points. They want fans to get excited — you like touchdowns. Y’all don’t really like sacks and things like that.”

     There has been talk about assigning sky judges inside replay booths throughout the league. But the competition committee is concerned about finding capable officials, of course. Meanwhile, Mahomes was left to ask about Kelce’s “legendary moment” gone awry. “That's something that only a couple of people in this world would even think about doing,’” he said. "For him to make that play in that moment, making the catch, making a couple dudes miss and throwing the ball across the field to another guy and scoring a touchdown in that moment — I hope they still show it whenever he goes into the Hall of Fame, because that's a moment that we didn't get to really witness.

     “Let us play the game. That’s why last week, I didn’t say anything. Let us play. The flag today was tough. Offensive offsides. You point to the ref, you’re good or not good. You have a discussion. That’s the ref’s job. For him to throw that flag, no explanation or anything. I saw the picture. He’s barely offsides. It didn’t affect the play at all. At all.”

     Next time, Toney should stay onside. But a bigger problem awaits the NFL amid the gambling riches of the playoffs. Maybe, as I wrote weeks ago, Swift can see Kelce away from stadiums. In that vein, CBS analyst Tony Romo made another booth mistake, referring to her as his “wife” before fixing himself with this: “I’m sorry, girlfriend.”

     “Not yet!” Jim Nantz joked.

     The commissioner of this bunch doesn’t want a $503 million player blaming his professional ills on a sales manager. That’s what Carl Cheffers does Monday through Friday.

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     Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.