Has it Felt Like NFL Officials Are Ruining Football? The Math Does Check Out.
It is with a heavy heart that I bring up this subject, 40 years removed from the greatest penalty call in NFL history. Ben Dreith may have confused Marty Lyons for Mark Gastineau, but when it came to knowing what the moment called for, he more than rose to the occasion.
Which is why I'm sad to report America has seemed to be running short of officials like him. Through the first month of the NFL season, we've all sensed it. What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it for four weeks, that there's something wrong with the game. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
This:
A referee starting a beef with Eric Wilson for the crime of simply trying to make a play and trying to help him up, and a side judge F-bombing Trey McBride. Both suspended on the same day.
But those are just the tip of the tip of the iceberg. The officiating problems around the league have been wide and deep. It's not your imagination. It's not just a couple of fan bases complaining because a call or two went against their team. It's a systemic problem. The data backs it up:
…in the second half of games in history
and 17 touchdowns nullified by penalty! (vs only 5 in 2025 & 4 in 2024)
Refs are impacting the most important moments of games unlike we've ever seen before in the NFL, and even some of the coaches are speaking up
full analysis and historical data:
Source - Week 4 of the 2026 NFL season saw 17 penalties per game.
That was the most in any NFL week since 2015. …
We've seen the most offensive penalties per game (7.64) in the first four weeks of a season since 2003. …
Offensive holding calls are the highest they have been at this point in a season since 2019. …
We've seen the #1 most penalties called on third or fourth down in the second half of games that I have on record since at least 2000. …
It's the most offensive penalties in the red zone that I have on record.
Refs are taking good plays and just removing them.
All of the year-over-year increase in penalties is on offense.
Defensive flags are actually down slightly, and defensive pass interference is below average. …
Red-zone offensive penalties are at a record: 0.61 per team per game.
That is up 30% …
These penalties are coming in the highest-leverage situations where they would have the most impact on the outcomes of these games:
#1 most penalties on third and fourth downs in the second half of games since 2000
#1 most red zone penalties per game by offenses since at least 2000
#1 highest rate of third and fourth down penalties per snap against offenses since 2000
Jaguars HC Liam Coen went out of his way to say after his Week 4 game that he had “never been a part of anything like that before in my life,” referring to his team being flagged 13 times for 125 yards, with 10 of those (for 100 yards) coming in the first half.
Note that I really pared this down to just the major bullet points. There's a lot more detail in the report with regards to Offensive EPA and such, but I didn't want to get too lost in the weeds. The main takeaway is that NFL crews are WAY over-officiating the most high leverage plays, across the board. On 3rd- and 4th downs. The red zone. Those precious few that have the greatest effect on the outcomes of games. They're calling penalties in record numbers. And they're doing so with a heavy emphasis against offenses, with offensive holding in those situations taking most of the abuse.
Of course, the counter argument to that is that they always call it tighter earlier in the season, to over-emphasize that some shenanigans will not be tolerated, and then ease up as the year goes along. But even by that standard, 2026 is a total outlier.
Besides, the whole concept of calling them differently in September than you do in October through February is nonsense to begin with. It's more of the NBA-ification of football. Where more and more calls are becoming subjective. Where there are different rules for different players. Where what happened becomes secondary to whom it happened to:
All I ask out of any sport is that they objectively enforce the rulebook as it's written, or change the rulebook. Whether we're talking about the NFL, NBA, Figure Skating, or Car Jitsu. Which exists, for reasons that cannot be explained:
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I grew up in a world where the American League famously had a higher strike zone than the National League, and that was just accepted like it was a law of nature. The way drains swirl counter-clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere or what have you. Baseball evolved away from that horseshit. To the point where ABS has eliminated every umpire having his own personal interpretation of what a ball or strike is. While football is heading further and further down the path of subjectivity. And making a bloody mess of the game in the process. Liam Coen is right. None of us has seen anything like it.
If I was an NFL coach (and it's by an accident of the universe that I am not), I would instruct my entire team, especially my offense, with an emphasis on the O-line, to bend every rule to the breaking point. Because if there's one thing that's guaranteed, it's that the league hates bad publicity like this. And will over-correct their earlier over-correction. That pendulum always swings back, and this one about to come in the other direction, hard and far. There are going to be acts of mayhem along the line of scrimmage, and those officials will be keeping those flags tucked away like they're sewn into their pockets.
If the first four weeks of the season have shown us anything, it's that they're calling games like people paid to watch them toss flags. But if Sunday taught us anything, there's no penalty so obvious that they can't ignore it if it suits their purposes:
Mark my words. This will be the least penalized week in the past 25 years. Guaranteed.