Dean Blandino on officiating controversy in NFC title game: ‘Obvious call and it has to be made’

Dean Blandino has dealt with more than his share of second-guessing of officials’ calls in the NFL.

That was the essence of his role as the league’s director of officiating.

‘No one feels worse right now than those officials’

Now, as an NFL rules analyst for Fox Sports, Blandino views the game from a different perspective. And he is part of an extremely large group of observers that believes the officials blew it with their non-call of an obvious defensive pass inference by Los Angeles Rams cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman with 1:49 left in the NFC Championship Game. A helmet-to-helmet contact against a defensiveness receiver could also have been called, but wasn’t before the Rams ultimately won the game in overtime, 26-23.

“They are human and they do miss calls from time to time, and we know that.”

“You get to that level, you’re in a championship game, it’s an obvious call and it has to be made,” Blandino told Bruce Murray and Brady Quinn on the SiriusXM Blitz. “And no one feels worse right now than those officials, but they are human and they do miss calls from time to time, and we know that.”

‘I just felt like it was a product of them letting them play all game’

How did it happen? Blandino suspects it was part of a larger philosophical approach to postseason games.

“I just felt like it was a product of them letting them play all game, which is good to an extent, and then not making the call when it needed to be made late in the game,” Blandino said.