The Cincinnati Bengals were already a dangerous enough opponent for the Kansas City Chiefs coming into Week 17 that they shouldn’t have needed any help from the officials.
When playing at Paul Brown Stadium, the home team got some additional calls anyway, especially in the second half, and members of Chiefs Kingdom, including several players and former players, took to Twitter to express their frustrations with the referees and officials in charge of Sunday’s game.
While the Chiefs certainly committed their fair share of penalties on Sunday and shot themselves in the foot on multiple occasions, there were also several calls that got in the way of what was an exciting and competitive game. There was the horse collar tackle call on L’Jarius Sneed. There were numerous pass interference calls that extended drives for the Bengals. They were everywhere in the fourth quarter.
As just one example, you can see this tackle from Sneed here that was called for 15 yards.
FLAG? pic.twitter.com/5qBkWMnz7u
— 준 Jun (@Royals_Jun) January 2, 2022
Here was the phantom PI on Sneed: pic.twitter.com/0hZAZ9dZ96
— Chiefs Hive (@chiefshive) January 2, 2022
Fellow Chiefs players were taking the game’s officials to task Twitter for their ridiculous calls, one after the other, that seemed to favor the Bengals so much late in the game when things counted the most.
Missed tackles, dropped passes, penalties, blown coverages. Who’s beating the Chiefs? The Chiefs https://t.co/1a8Z9QUpyu
— The Cookie Expert (@JeffAllen71) January 2, 2022
Personal foul for tackling? What the hell is this.
— Geoff Schwartz (@geoffschwartz) January 2, 2022
What the hell is going on with these refs? https://t.co/o6IMbpm0hE
— Mitchell Schwartz (@MitchSchwartz71) January 2, 2022
https://twitter.com/Lammons_1/status/1477738505287651329
So do we not call offensive pass interference anymore? Mfs quick to call PI on our DBs yet every deep ball catch has been a push off. Wtf
— Saint Binky 2x (@khalenNOTkaylen) January 2, 2022
Even those of us on the outside could not believe what we were watching in terms of the officiating on Sunday. Fans and those who cover the Chiefs were livid about the state of things against the Bengals.
The Chiefs got hosed twice on that drive, but they can’t tackle today and make up for it by dropping passes and taking (legit) huge penalties
— Matt Verderame (@MattVerderame) January 2, 2022
Officials are officially bad.
— Arrowhead Addict (@ArrowheadAddict) January 2, 2022
Where is everyone who was caping for the refs early in the game? They have been terrible for both teams today.
— Patrick Allen (@RPatrickAllen) January 2, 2022
That’s an unconscionable call. That is a game changing mistake that refs should not have license to make
— jake the greek (@kokogadget1) January 2, 2022