The Buffalo Bills cruised past the Denver Broncos for a 31-7 victory in the Wild Card Round. Josh Allen was slow out of the gate, but he exploded for a couple of touchdowns after halftime. Buffalo put up 21 unanswered points over the final two frames.
It was a collective effort and a dominant performance. There aren’t too many notes in advance of next week’s anticipated Bills-Ravens showdown. That should be must-watch television, with two MVP candidates and two of the NFL’s best all-around rosters.
That said, there was a viral moment involving Allen that raised more than a few furrowed brows on Sunday afternoon. After a missed call, official Bill Vinovich ventured to the Bills sideline to apologize to Allen directly. Not exactly a normal interaction between ref and player.
Nobody is actually calling foul play, but the optics are hilarious. Allen is one of the NFL’s brightest stars. The “rigged” jokes practically write themselves, especially considering the run Buffalo went on in the second half.
Kansas City Chiefs fans are especially incensed with the lack of a strong reaction to that clip. Their contention? That if Patrick Mahomes was seen receiving private apologies from the refs, there’d be an uproar of unprecedented scale on the Twitterverse.
The comedy here is undeniable, although there should be no serious quibbling with a ref confessing to a mistake and engaging the wronged party in a cordial conversation. If anything, we need more of this in professional sports, the NFL most of all. Refs are under an intense spotlight. It’s an impossible job to placate two teams and two fandoms at once, but all the same, there are too many examples of officials refusing to admit to their failures. It can even lead to further penalties on the wronged party when they express their discontentment to the errant officials.
Mahomes does have a long and complicated history with refs. He tends to voice his frustrations rather freely. It’s a luxury afforded to a three-time Super Bowl champ and the greatest player of his generation. Nobody blinks when Mahomes is complaining, except for those complaining about his complaining.
The Chiefs, by virtue of their excellence, also tend to receive what feels like a favorable whistle, which just ramps up the irony when Mahomes does feel mistreated. It also leads to the playful “rigged” jokes alluded to earlier. If any team is plagued by faux accusations of tampering with the officials, it’s the Chiefs. Those allegations never actually carry water, to be absolutely clear, but Mahomes chopping it up with the refs in private would provide plenty of internet fodder.
We are a couple wins away from Chiefs-Bills as a potential AFC Championship Game matchup. That would be must-watch television. Hopefully, if it does happen, the refs commit to the bit and start holding hushed sideline conversations with one of the Pro Bowl quarterbacks. Just for laughs.
