An inadvertent whistle may have taken a touchdown away from the New England Patriots Monday night, and there’s really only one way to describe how it happened.
People make mistakes.
After New England’s 20-13 win over the Buffalo Bills, referee Gene Steratore explained what happened on the play.
“I think as the quarterback started to get near the sideline and press the line judge [Gary Arthur], who was the official right near the quarterback … Tom [Brady] released the football, the line judge lost track of maybe where the ball was at that point and almost by its own definition, inadvertently blew the whistle,” he told a pool reporter, per Mike Reiss of ESPN.com. “What we do from that point onward is find out where the football was at the time the whistle was blown. We deemed it to be, in our judgment, received by the receiver, as we stated, at the 45-yard line, I believe. And then by rule, what you do with that, or once you determine in your judgment where the ball was at the time of the whistle, if it’s in a possession of a player, which we deemed it to be, you take all fouls then that would have been on that play and you enforce them from that spot of where the ball would be declared dead by the inadvertent whistle.”
Rex Ryan was called for a 15-yard penalty on the play for obstructing an official’s view, and that could explain why the whistle was blown prematurely.
“We had a bench-area obstruction foul then, that we actually tacked on to the spot of, I believe we went from the 45 to the 40-yard line, because we tacked on the 15-yard foul from that spot,” Steratore added. “So that’s what you do with the play, as it goes by rule.”
Again, people make mistakes. But did the officials know they had cost the Patriots a huge play and reward them the reception because of that? As Steratore noted, the crew deemed that the ball was in possession of a player when the whistle blew. If you watch the video of the play, you can clearly see that the whistle blew before Danny Amendola had secured the catch.
There are plenty of people who believe the NFL is out to get the Patriots, and there has certainly been evidence to support that. But in this case, the league has to be relieved that New England won. Had the Patriots lost their first game of the season on a night in which an inadvertent whistle may have cost them a touchdown, the NFL would have another PR nightmare on its hands.
