The talk on Tuesday morning is that the Detroit Lions were robbed by the referees in their 23-22 loss to the Green Bay Packers on Monday night, as a pair of phantom illegal-hands-to-the-face penalties on Lions defensive lineman Trey Flowers in the fourth quarter allowed the Packers to erase a nine-point deficit and come away with a one-point win.
Afterward, Los Angeles Rams linebacker (and former Packer) Clay Matthews took to Twitter to criticize the NFL's senior vice president of officiating, Al Riveron.
“The storyline for the 2019 season continues to be the refs inability to make the accurate and correct calls week in and week out,” wrote Matthews. “Al Riveron continues to blindly side with his refs and the current status quo. Something must change! Zero accountability.”
It feels like people say this every week, every season, and most of the time, nothing changes.
Of course, the NFL has attempted reform as recently as this past offseason, as a horrendous no-call on what should have been a pivotal pass interference penalty against the Los Angeles Rams in their NFC Championship Game win over the New Orleans Saints last season prompted the league to make pass interference a reviewable call.
But that is just one tiny slice of the pie.
Is the NFL going to now make illegal-hands-to-the-face a reviewable penalty, as well? Are they going to make every call reviewable (yeah right)? Or do the officials simply need to do a better job of making the right calls on plays that are clear as day?
Whatever the case may be, this is a problem that isn't going away.