Referee explains why he didn’t call DPI against Chiefs on controversial Kyle Pitts play

Rewind the clocks a minute, back to the days before the Kansas City Chiefs turned into the NFL's current dynasty. In those years, the New England Patriots were winning Super Bowls left and right. Questionable calls or no-calls would happen and casual fans would say the game was rigged for the Patriots.

Well, my friends, the Chiefs are now that team, the one that apparently "gets all of the calls." The accusations come with the territory.

The latest instance of the Chiefs "paying the refs" is from Week 3's win over the Falcons. Leading 22-17 with a little over four minutes to go in the game, Atlanta had the ball on the Chiefs' 6-yard line after marching down the field on what ended up being a 15-play, 83-yard drive. On 3rd-and-5, Kirk Cousins sent the ball in Kyle Pitts' direction and the play was ruled incomplete.

After watching the play again, it looked as though Bryan Cook interfered with Pitts on the play. Had it been ruled as defensive pass interference, the Falcons would have received a first down and had three (potentially four) more cracks at finding the end zone and taking the lead. DPI was not called, however, and the Falcons failed to convert on fourth down.

Head official Tra Blake spoke after the game and noted that "From the angle that [the officials] had at the time, they did not feel that there was a foul committed". Seems pretty straightforward, right? The refs didn't see anything in the moment that made them think it was an illegal play.

Refs say they didn't think Bryan Cook committed DPI on Kyle Pitts

These are truly wild times we're living in, as people accuse the Chiefs of paying the refs. Never mind that earlier in the game, Chiefs pass rusher Chris Jones was called for a ridiculous roughing the passer call that gave Atlanta a fresh set of downs. Never mind that last week, Chiefs left tackle Wanya Morris was called with a key penalty that wiped out a 20+ yard play for the Chiefs against the Bengals.

People only want to say that the Chiefs get this kind of call (or in this case, a no-call) in key moments and it's exactly like when the Patriots were at the top of the mountain every year. What this boils down to is that the refs aren't going to be able to call everything.

Also, it's not like this was the final play of the game. The Falcons had 4th-and-5 to try and convert and failed. When the Chiefs went 3-and-out on their next drive, Atlanta had another chance to try and win the game and elected to call an idiotic play on 4th-and-inches that Nick Bolton sniffed out.

This isn't going to stop people from saying the Chiefs are cheaters though. It's just the world we live in now and Chiefs fans probably aren't going to be complaining about it because it means others are threatened by their favorite team. There are worse problems to have.