There’s not much question about whether the Detroit Lions’ trick play against the Kansas City Chiefs was against the rules. Lions quarterback Jared Goff was called for an illegal motion on a play he motioned from quarterback to receiver and caught a touchdown pass from David Montgomery. By definition, Jared Goff had established himself as a T-formation quarterback by standing directly behind center, which meant that if he went into motion, he needed to stop for a full second before the snap. He didn’t, and it was correctly flagged.
But what remains under question is how the officials got there. The flag was not initially called on the play, but after conferring for well over a minute, officials threw the flag and the play was nullified.
There are two very different accounts of what happened during that time.
Lead official Craig Wrolstad explained it like this after the game.
“It’s my job to see if the quarterback stopped initially. The down judge watches the player in motion, and we had to communicate between him, my umpire, and my line judge whether or not he initially stopped at the quarterback position and then whether he stopped after he went in motion out of my view toward the left-hand side of the field. There was a little bit of confusion in our discussion whether he had stopped initially or whether he had stopped at the end and what we were talking about. That’s why the flag came in so late.”
Wrolstad was then asked if the officiating hub in New York assisted in any way with the call.
“We did not have any assistance from Kansas City or New York,” Wrolstad said.
After the game, Lions coach Dan Campbell wasn’t eager to talk about the play, but his account is very different when it comes to that last detail.
“Well, it doesn’t matter if I agree or disagree. I know it came from New York,” Campbell said.
At the time, it wasn’t clear if Campbell was making an assumption or told that directly. But during his radio appearance on the “Costa and Jansen show with Heather” Wednesday, Campbell was asked to clarify if he was told directly by an official that the call came from New York. Campbell’s response:
“Yeah.”
While the most important thing is that they got the call right, it’s fair to point out here that if the officials did get consultation from New York, that is a breaking of the league’s own rules. The New York hub can assist in the following gameday occurrences:
- Coaches’ challenges
- Failed fourth-down attempts
- Game and play clock
- Plays after the two-minute warning
- Plays during overtime
- Plays that can be adjudicated under the Replay Assist rule
- Scoring plays (including all Try attempts)
- Turnovers
And the plays that are eligible for replay assistance help include:
- Penalty enforcement
- Confirmation of the proper down
- Spot of a foul
- Game clock administration
- Possession of a loose ball
- Complete or incomplete pass
- Loose ball touching a boundary line, goal line, or end line
- Location of the football or a player in relation to a line or the pocket area
- Player down by contact (when not ruled down on the field)
- Late hits out of bounds
- Roughing the passer based only on a hit to the passer’s head or neck area
- Intentional Grounding only if relative to the pocket or ball landing beyond the line of scrimmage
- Unnecessary roughness based only on:
- Forcibly contacting a runner when he is out of bounds
- Forcibly hitting a defenseless player’s head or neck area
- Twisting, pulling or turning the facemask or helmet opening
- A horse-collar tackle
- Tripping
- Roughing or running into the kicker
There is nothing there that suggests New York should be able to help with a penalty involving illegal motion. While it was a scoring play—which are subject to the hub’s review—the aspect of the play that was allegedly reviewed is not under the list of eligible rulings that are reviewable.
Perhaps more concerning is the fact that the officials on the field apparently have different accounts of what actually happened. Wrolstad’s account does not match that of the official who spoke with Campbell.
Campbell was asked if they have reached out to the league about everything that unfolded in those moments. He confirmed that they had, but couldn’t speak on the responses they got from the NFL.
“Yeah, we asked on all of that. We asked on all of that, and I can’t tell you all of that (response),” Campbell said.
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