Ball Don’t Lie: 3 horrible calls that ruined the end of Chiefs-Packers

If there was an Olympic sport for ruining the ending of football games, the NFL refs in charge of Sunday Night Football between the Chiefs and Packers would win a gold medal.

Green Bay came away with a 27-19 victory, but all anyone will be talking about is the slew of terrible calls they made against both sides to completely overshadow the game itself.

Before we get into the referees and their miscues, let's start with an honorable mention for the stupidest moment of the final minutes. It wasn't a bad call, instead, it was a boneheaded decision.

Isiah Pacheco punched a Packers defender during the fumble return that was ultimately called back. Putting aside the utter stupidity of taking a closed-fist swipe at a man in a football helmet, Pacheco got himself ejected at a critical moment of the game and set his team back 15 yards completely unnecessarily.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the only outrageous moment of the final minutes.

3. Forward progress ruling on MVS

We start with the ruling that Marquez Valdes-Scantling went out of bounds with 19 seconds remaining at the Green Bay 33-yard line. The problem is his forward progress was very clearly stopped in bounds.

Ruling that the clock should stop on that play is egregious. The clock should have kept running, forcing the Chiefs to clock the ball, losing a down and valuable seconds.

2. Late hit on Patrick Mahomes

Before that terrible out-of-bounds ruling, the official on the other side of the field made an even bigger blunder when they threw a flag for unnecessary roughness on Jonathan Owens for a hit he laid on Patrick Mahomes as he went out of bounds.

Mahomes scrambled to his right with just over a minute to go and made it to the first down marker before heading out of bounds. While he was still in the field of play and before any whistle had blown, Owens crashed into the Chiefs quarterback.

It was a violent hit, so it's no surprise the ref threw a flag there just for the heck of it, but it was absolutely the wrong call.

1. Missed pass interference on MVS deep shot

The first two terrible calls went against the Packers, but the worst call went against the Chiefs.

Somehow, someway, the refs swallowed their whistles as Carrington Valentine committed the most obvious form of pass interference on Valdes-Scantling you'll ever see.

There isn't a universe where that isn't pass interference. He's early. He's on the receiver's back. It's black and white. It's interference.

The Chiefs should have gotten the ball inside the 10-yard line. It should have been first-and-goal with 45 or so seconds remaining.

Who knows if Mahomes would have engineered a touchdown from that close. Who knows if Kansas City could have successfully run a two-point conversion to tie the game if he did. Who knows what the outcome might have been....But we do know that the refs absolutely botched the ending of the game.