The referees hate the New Orleans Saints.

In the Saints' 34-31 win over the Carolina Panthers, the officiating crew on the scene gave the home crowd a cruel reminder of the NFC Championship no-call defensive pass interference. Ron Rivera challenged a no-call on Saints safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson — Rivera got it.

The officials, after a brief moment of huddling up, gave Carolina a new set of downs at the Saints' 3-yard line. The defensive pass interference, in the eyes of many, was a weak one, not worth the fresh set of downs for the Panthers.

Saints head coach Sean Payton, who has publicly disagreed with NFL officiating in the past — often for a good reason — had some words to say about the matter after the game.

It wasn’t our best game, it wasn’t their best game and quite honestly it wasn’t New York’s best game,” said Payton, via Katherine Terrell of The Athletic.

Payton better whip out his checkbook, because one can assume the NFL will come down with fines for criticizing something worth criticizing. That's nothing new to him, yet he won't mince words.

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JC Latham (Alabama), Chris Braswell (Alabama not Jaguars), Cornelieus Johnson (Michigan) in action behind a New Orleans Saints logo with a 2024 NFL Draft background.

Dylan Bruton ·

The sad reality of the matter is that the ability to challenge pass interference stems from the infamous no-call against the Saints in the NFC Championship. According to ESPN, it had not been successful in 74 attempts heading into Week 12, save for three instances. It's rare to see a coach win the challenge, yet Rivera got it on a very weak call.

Again, NFL officiating hates the New Orleans Saints.