One of the strangest passages of play I’ve seen in a while took place in the fourth quarter of the playoff game between the Buffalo Bills and the Indianapolis Colts on Saturday.
With the Bills leading 27-24, Philip Rivers was leading the Colts on a drive down the field. He completed a pass to Zach Pascal, who fell to the ground … but then appeared to get up, try and run up the field, and then had the ball stripped, which the Bills recovered.
Refs ruled the play dead, however, saying that Pascal had fallen to the ground after catching. Then … things got really weird.
Rivers rushed the Colts to the line of scrimmage, and appeared to get a play off. But … refs ruled it dead, and appeared to signal that Buffalo had called a timeout. They then went to review the previous play, and everyone assumed that it was a clear fumble and it would be Bills ball.
The refs ruled this no fumble, did they get it right?
pic.twitter.com/WVGSl2dBeF— PFF (@PFF) January 9, 2021
The one argument that some Colts fans were making was that the Bills hadn’t gotten their timeout called in time, and that thus the play shouldn’t have been reviewed.
Then the ref came out and said … the opposite of both of those things. First he said the ruling on the field stood, which was very bizarre because it was pretty clearly a fumble. Then, he said Buffalo wouldn’t be charged a timeout, because they’d never actually called a timeout — rather, it was the replay official who called the timeout.
It all ended up being for naught, as the Bills hung on to win the game. But NFL fans were befuddled: