What happened in the Bengals-Bills game on Sunday night was the kind of officiating sequence that leaves coaches frustrated, fans confused, and the league office with a few questions to answer. It started with a big play, a potential touchdown run, and ended in a tangled mess of penalties, challenges, and procedural missteps.
Let’s walk through the sequence.
The play began with what looked like a scoring run - but it didn’t stand. A holding penalty at the line of scrimmage wiped the touchdown off the board.
That’s straightforward enough. But what followed was anything but.
As the Bills were lining up for the next snap, with 14 seconds left on the play clock, Bengals head coach Zac Taylor threw the challenge flag. The question he wanted answered: did James Cook fumble the ball before crossing the goal line, and if so, did it go out of bounds in the end zone? Because if that’s the case, and the ball went out of bounds in the end zone before a touchdown was confirmed, the result would be a touchback - Bengals ball.
Replay showed that Cook did fumble, but the ball didn’t go out of bounds in the end zone. It actually crossed the sideline just before the pylon.
That’s a critical distinction. Since it didn’t go out of bounds in the end zone, there’s no touchback.
And since the touchdown was nullified by the hold, the ball was placed at the 1-yard line - the spot where Cook lost control. So, no touchdown, no touchback, and the holding penalty still stands.
But here’s where things get messy.
Even though the outcome of the play changed - from touchdown to out of bounds at the 1 - and Taylor technically “won” the challenge, the rules say he shouldn’t have been allowed to challenge the play in the first place.
Why? Because the play was initially ruled a touchdown.
And when a touchdown is called on the field, it automatically triggers a booth review. That’s not optional.
It's part of the NFL’s standard replay protocol. Coaches are not permitted to challenge scoring plays, even if a penalty later wipes the score off the board.
The booth is supposed to handle that.
In this case, the replay booth didn’t initiate the review, which they should have. That’s on replay official Denise Crudup and replay assistant Brian Smith. Then, when Taylor threw the challenge flag, the officiating crew - led by referee Brad Rogers - allowed it to proceed, even though the rules prohibit it.
Now, the NFL rulebook does give referees some discretion in these moments. If a coach throws a challenge flag on a play that should have been reviewed by the booth, and the coach appears to be acting in good faith - genuinely confused by the call or the process - the referee can choose not to penalize the team with a lost challenge or timeout.
But that’s discretionary. And in this case, the fact that the booth didn’t trigger a review to begin with only compounds the issue.
So what we ended up with was a rare double error: the replay booth didn’t step in when it should have, and the officiating crew allowed a challenge that wasn’t allowed under the rules. The result? No change to the game situation - the Bills were still pushed back 10 yards from the holding call - but the process was flawed from top to bottom.
And while there may not have been any immediate impact on the scoreboard, these are exactly the kinds of missteps that the league scrutinizes when it comes time to assign postseason crews. Because when the stakes are higher in January, the margin for error shrinks. This wasn’t just a confusing moment - it was a breakdown in procedural execution, and it’s the kind of thing that can’t happen when the games matter most.