The Chiefs and Ravens are squaring off in the AFC championship on Sunday for the right to go to Super Bowl 58. While Baltimore is favored to win the matchup, some NFL fans are worried that the league is trying to stack the deck in Kansas City's favor.
The Chiefs have drawn more attention than any other team in the NFL this season. That makes sense considering that they are the reigning Super Bowl champions and have Patrick Mahomes at quarterback.
However, the recognition Kansas City has received hasn't always been because of its on-field performance. It's because the team has the most notable celebrity fan attached to it this season in Taylor Swift.
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Swift went public with her relationship with Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce in the early days of the 2023 NFL season. Since then, the pop star has consistently attended Kansas City's games and has been featured on the broadcast frequently when she is in attendance.
The NFL has benefitted greatly from Swift's presence. Her fans — known as "Swifties" — have taken an interest in the sport because of it. Whether they are watching games just to catch a glimpse of Swift or because they have become actually football fans remains to be seen, but either way, viewership is up.
As such, many believe that the NFL would like the Chiefs to make it to the Super Bowl, as Swift attending the event may make it the most-watched Super Bowl in NFL history.
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Just how much might the league want that to happen? A subset of NFL fans believes that the league's officiating assignment for the game is indicative of a conspiracy favoring the Chiefs.
Taylor Swift conspiracy theory, explained
The so-called "Taylor Swift conspiracy" has come about because the NFL assigned veteran official Shawn Smith to be the referee for Sunday's AFC championship game.
Smith has been an NFL official since 2015 and was promoted to referee ahead of the '18 NFL season. He certainly is a qualified official, as evidenced by his selection to a postseason crew — a right reserved only for the league's best and brightest.
That said, Smith has favored the road team at a surprisingly high clip in recent seasons. Home teams have won just 40.8 percent of the games that Smith has officiated the past three seasons, per Warren Sharp of Sharp Football Analysis. Home teams in general have won an average of 55.4 percent of NFL games over that same span.
Because of these skewed numbers, Smith ranks No. 1 among officials in road winning percentage since his referee debut in 2018. The numbers from the 2023 season showcase that he has, in fact, favored the road team, at least when it comes to calling penalties.
Smith's crews have called the seventh-most penalties per game during the season with a mark of 12.19, per data from NFLReferees.com. Those penalties have been on the home team 53.32 percent of the time, a mark that ranks the third highest in the NFL behind only Clay Martin (56.32 percent) and Craig Wrolstad (53.54 percent).
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All of that would seemingly benefit the Chiefs, which is why Swift's name has been attached to the conspiracy. In the minds of its creators, the decision to make Smith the referee is all about ensuring that she and the Chiefs will be on to Las Vegas by the game's end.
Of course, that isn't the full story. It should be noted that Smith routinely had to work in games where the home team was at a disadvantage. The overall record of the squads that played at home in his games this season was 117-155, good for a winning percentage of .430. Meanwhile, the road teams over the season were 152-120, good for a .559 winning percentage.
With that in mind, Smith's home-team winning percentage doesn't look quite as skewed.
That still hasn't stopped NFL fans from wondering whether Smith's assignment was made to favor the Chiefs. After all, what better way to give the Chiefs a slight edge than to give a respected but slightly road-favoring official a crack at officiating the game?
The conspiracy is only strengthened by the fact that Clete Blakeman was granted the other assignment. Just 47.99 percent of his penalties have been called on the home team this season, a middle-of-the-pack mark compared to Smith's top-three ranking.
Still, that's all that this chatter is — a conspiracy theory. If the Chiefs manage to win or keep it close and there are some questionable calls, then perhaps there will be something to it.
If the Ravens can handle the Chiefs with relative ease or the officials remain out of sight, out of mind for the majority of the contest, then it will be clear that there was nothing underhanded about this officiating assignment.
