NFL Scriptwriters Gone Crazy

The potential of the NFL being “scripted” is nothing new but recently this has come into the spotlight following the Chiefs vs Bengals AFC championship game even reaching number one trending on Twitter with the hashtag NFLRIGGED.

First off when people say scripted obviously this is almost impossible to script every single game down to the minute detail but it still is very possible that the NFL “fixes” games and favors certain teams in certain games. 

On third down & nine with nine minutes and thirty seconds left in the fourth quarter the Kansas City Chiefs looked to lose all momentum after Travis Kelce caught the ball but was short of the first down. At this exact moment, the world saw how the NFL actually has the possibility of being fixed by officiating. Directly after the refs discussed the previous play and gave the Chiefs a redo on the third down because of a clock issue after the down was already played. This gave the Chiefs another chance to continue the drive. On the redo down the Bengals seemingly had a “ball don’t lie” moment when the defense sacked Patrick Mahomes but dramatically there was a flag in the secondary on the Bengals for defensive holding. The defensive holding could be called on almost every single play of football when being broken down frame by frame but to call this at the moment in the game and give all the momentum back to the Chiefs looked very suspicious and in obvious favor of the Chiefs due only to the officiating.  Cincinnati Bengals fan Marc Benz was left confused and upset by the calls in the game “It seemed like every time the Bengals did something good the refs just let the Chiefs back in the game with questionable calls”.

The contentious officiating came back to bite the Bengals again when the most important drive of the game came with approximately two minutes left in the fourth quarter. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow stepped back in the pocket and released the ball out of his hand then seconds later he was hit by a Chiefs player late which would usually result in a roughing of the passer penalty but Burrow did not get the flag in his favor. “Burrow got hit late after his throw blatantly and there was no call but when Mahomes got barely touched while barely being out of bounds and he got the call because he flopped. It cost the entire game” says lifelong Bengals fan Carter Johnson. 

The Kansas City Chiefs will now face the Philadelphia Eagles in the Superbowl in Glendale Arizona. A few coincidences make this game seem even more scripted though. Quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs Patrick Mahomes is one of the main spokespeople for State Farm Insurance. Where is the game being played you may ask? State Farm Stadium. “It does seem weird to me that the spokesperson who will be in commercials during the game is the one who advanced to the championship,” says Munil Ana. The second weird coincidence is that it will be the first Superbowl played with one brother on each team. Travis Kelce the tight end for the Chiefs and Jason Kelce the center for the Eagles both made it to the Superbowl in the possibly last game that Jason will play in. The final coincidence is that the two teams in the Superbowl have big markets which would mean there is more money involved for the NFL and as a business the NFL will take each penny they can make.

Is the NFL scripted? No, it is probably not scripted out that’s almost impossible. Is there a possibility that some of the games are fixed by officiating? Yes, there is a possibility this is true. Will we as fans of the game of football continue watching the league if some games are fixed? Most likely yes.