If you've been on social media the past day, you've probably seen the image of an official appearing to celebrate a touchdown with the Patriots in their AFC title game against the Jaguars.
Ref celebrating with the Patriots after a touchdown? Football is weird pic.twitter.com/VDoWIZ4CTt
— The Hockey Gods! (@HockeyGods) January 21, 2018
But most people have just been tweeting the still image of an official smiling after a Pats TD, which completely takes the moment out of context. Very few showed the video of what happened with the official and the Patriots to show why he was smiling.
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Here is what happened:
As you can see, Jaguars safety Tashaun Gipson (No. 39) was in the middle of two Patriots players, so the official comes over to break them up before anything happens. Patriots offensive lineman Cameron Fleming (No. 71) appears to say something along the lines of "I wasn't talking trash," so the official didn't throw a flag on him.
Whatever wording Fleming chose was apparently funny, so the official, back judge Tony Steratore, laughed. It really isn't deeper than that.
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The officials did play a big role in the game, though. The Jaguars received six penalties for 98 yards while the Patriots escaped without a penalty on offense or defense. We're not saying there was anything nefarious going on, but the Jacksonville players definitely took notice.
"The stats speak for themselves," defensive tackle Malik Jackson said when asked about the discrepancy.
"I'll just say that's self-explanatory," linebacker Myles Jack added. "Interesting. That's all I'm going to say."
The Jaguars were called twice for defensive interference against New England after having two PI calls against them in the entire regular season, so it's not surprising the Jags were upset afterward. But let's not put on our tin foil hats and claim conspiracy just because of a few controversial calls.
