The Bengals will see a familiar name in the referee’s spot Sunday in Madrid, and that matters because Adrian Hill Wrolstad’s crew has been one of the most penalty-heavy groups in the league this season.
Cincinnati is 6-5 with Wrolstad as the head referee, and the last Bengals game he worked was last year’s Thanksgiving night win in Baltimore. His crew currently ranks third in the NFL with an average of 17.14 accepted penalties per game.
That’s a sharp jump from last year, when the group finished 12th at 11.61, and it comes after ranking second in 2024 with 14.82. Wrolstad’s crew was 13th in 2023 at 9.88 and 16th in 2022 at 9.35.
The flags have piled up in a very specific way. Wrolstad’s crew has thrown 17 defensive pass interference penalties this season, the most in the league and four more than any other crew.
At the same time, it has called only one defensive holding penalty all year, which is the fewest in the NFL. The unit has also logged five roughing-the-passer calls, one behind the league lead, and 26 offensive holding penalties, good for fifth-most.
The referee assignment also brings back an old Bengals sore spot, though not through Wrolstad himself. In a 2021 road game against the New York Jets, a late third-and-11 play involving Mike Hilton drew a flag that helped swing a 34-31 Jets win as 11-point underdogs.
The call came from line judge Tripp Sutter, not Wrolstad, and Sutter has had multiple run-ins with the Bengals coaching staff. Sutter is not on Sunday’s game, since he works on Ron Torbert’s crew this season.
Wrolstad has been a head official since 2014 and has picked up playoff assignments in each of the four three seasons after missing the postseason schedule in five of his first seven years. He also worked the Pittsburgh Steelers-Houston Texans Wild-Card game in 2025.
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