The outcomes of too many NFL games seem to hinge on questionable defensive pass-interference calls with the Denver Broncos the latest team to benefit in Sunday night's 30-26 defeat of the Los Angeles Rams.
As Sunday night's thrilling game between the Denver Broncos and Los Angeles Rams began to reach its climax, all of a sudden a soccer match broke out.
With the Broncos trailing 26-23 and facing 3rd-and-6 from the Rams' 11 with 1:15 to play, Denver receiver Pat Bryant ran an out-breaking route to the right sideline with Los Angeles cornerback Josh Wallace in tight coverage.
As quarterback Bo Nix delivered the ball, Wallace shadowed Bryant and the two appeared to exchange light shoves before Bryant theatrically threw his arms in the air and tumbled to the ground, which allowed the ball to fly past him and into Wallace's arms for an apparent game-ending interception.
But then a yellow flag fluttered to the ground with the official ruling that Wallace had interfered with Bryant's ability to catch the ball. The defensive pass interference (DPI) penalty gave the Broncos the ball at the Rams' seven and six plays later Nix snuck in from the one for the winning score in the 30-26 victory.
The DPI call opened a can of worms: was it really defensive pass interference?
For his part, NBC rules analyst Terry McAulay, a 19-year NFL official, was immediately skeptical: "I don't see the defender do anything that significantly hinders the receiver on this play," he said during NBC's broadcast, as reported by Yahoo Sports.
On Monday, Bryant did indeed acknowledge that he "sold" the call in order to get a flag. "A little pass interference. I sold it just a little bit," Bryant said, according to the Associated Press. "At the end of the day, you've got to do what you've got to do to win. That's all."
The controversial play was not an isolated incident on Sunday. A few hours earlier as the Baltimore Ravens and Dallas Cowboys played out the final moments of their game in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, a similar situation arose.
With 28 seconds left in a game the Ravens led 31-28, Cowboys' receiver CeeDee Lamb and Ravens' cornerback Nate Wiggins battled for a pass near the Baltimore goal line. As a flag flew, the instant opinion of CBS analyst J.J. Watt was that it was pass interference - of the offensive variety. Replays clearly showed that Lamb had hooked Wiggins' arm, preventing him from potentially intercepting the ball.
Instead, DPI was called, which enabled the Cowboys to kick a tying field goal. Fortunately for the Ravens, a long pass moved them into Dallas territory with a second left and kicker Tyler Loop booted a 56-yard field as time expired to give the Ravens a 34-31 win.
Back in Denver, Rams' quarterback Matthew Stafford tried to rally his team after Nix's go-ahead score, but Denver safety Talanoa Hufanga intercepted Stafford in the Broncos' end zone on the final play to seal the win.
Debating DPI calls has become an almost weekly occurrence in the NFL, mainly because if you asked 10 people you'd get 10 different answers as to what DPI truly is. But what can be done to further standardize a subjective penalty that carries such a heavy cost for the defense: the ball placed at the spot of the foul, which can occur 50, 60 or even 70 yards downfield, with an automatic first down?
On Tuesday, The Athletic convened a roundtable featuring 10 of its NFL writers to discuss the topic. They offered five possible solutions:
1. Allow extensive replay review. The NFL actually did make DPI a reviewable offense in the 2019 season, following the Rams' controversial defeat of the New Orleans Saints (ironically coached by current Denver head man Sean Payton) in the 2018 NFC Championship Game in which what appeared to be an obvious DPI foul against Los Angeles went uncalled, but the review experiment died after one season.
"The NFL should adopt soccer’s VAR system to quickly legislate these calls," national NFL writer Jeff Howe reasoned. "Let the on-field crew call the game as usual, but give the VAR crew authority to overturn calls until the next play is snapped. If VAR doesn’t find a problem in that short window, it probably shouldn’t be worth a more time-consuming review anyway."
2. Allow limited replay review. "Maybe the league could implement a rule where, if a flag is thrown for DPI on an end-zone target or a play that would have resulted in a turnover, it triggers an automatic review to confirm that DPI actually occurred," said Colton Pouncy, Detroit Lions beat writer. "Those situations are rare enough that they wouldn’t be a major disruption to the flow of a game."
Pouncy also noted that making DPI a blanket 15-yard penalty like it is in college instead of a spot foul could be part of a solution.
3. Improve the real-time officiating. "The NFL and the referees association agreed to a new seven-year contract in May that included more offseason training time for officials," said Broncos beat writer Nick Kosmider. "Continuing to seek ways to improve the performance of those making the highly subjective calls in critical moments might not be a magic-wand fix, but what evidence have we seen that such a fix is out there?"
4. Loosen the rules. "I’d like to see two changes," offered Jeff Zrebiec, Baltimore Ravens beat writer. "One, let them play more and fight through contact. Current rules are so heavily favored for the offense, and these passing offenses are so precise, that you need to give DBs a bit more leeway to get their hands on receivers and have a fighting chance to make a play on the ball....I’d also like to see pass interference be one of the things that the 'eye in the sky' can look at and radio down if it’s an obvious missed call. They don’t have to be heavy handed with it, but at least correct the obvious mistakes."
5. Get over it. "We saw how futile this was in 2019, after the knee-jerk reaction to what happened to Payton’s Saints," pointed out national NFL writer Mike Silver. "You can’t play God with the eye in the sky and expect your consumers to roll with it. Imagine witnessing an indelible play - like The Catch or the Music City Miracle or the Beast Quake run - and then having an official go back, spot a foul and decree that it never happened. That’s a truly nightmarish scenario."
One thing that they and we all know is true is that any full-proof solution that is found - if one can even possibly exist - can't be implemented until the 2027 season at the earliest, so expect the debate over questionable DPI calls to continue until the final whistle of Super Bowl LXI in February.
