KANSAS CITY Khalen Saunders Jersey Cheap , Mo. (AP) — mistake to decide the Super Bowl.On Sunday, the league might have made enough errors to determine both teams that will play in the championship game in two weeks.The most egregious gaffe came in the NFC title game in New Orleans. The Saints were in position to put away the Rams when Tommylee Lewis blatantly was interfered with inside the Los Angeles 5-yard line by cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman. Not only did Robey-Coleman hit Lewis early, he did so helmet to helmet. Next weekend, we’ll hear about Robey-Coleman being fined for the collision — even though, incredibly, no flag was thrown.“Came to the sideline, looked at the football gods and was like, ‘Thank you,'” Robey-Coleman said. “I got away with one tonight.”Such a big one that it kept the Rams alive. Instead of a first down and the chance to run down the clock before making a field goal, or score a touchdown for a bigger lead, the Saints wound up with Wil Lutz’s 31-yard kick. That made it 23-20 with 1:41 left in regulation, plenty of time for the Rams to march to Greg Zuerlein’s tying 48-yard field goal.“Greg The Leg” won it with a 57-yarder in OT. His heroics almost certainly never would have happened had the call on Robey-Coleman been made. And the fact the defender led with his head into Lewis’ helmet at a time when the NFL is adamant that it’s doing everything to get such hits out of the sport should be even more maddening.“They felt like the players — the player — arrived at the same time that the ball did,” Saints coach Sean Payton said, trying to be diplomatic when he had every right to rant and rave. “They didn’t feel like it was an interference call.“Look, it’s a tough way to lose a game, especially when you’re in a position like that to win it. It’s all the more reason why we need more replay. We lose a chance to go to the Super Bowl with a call like that Khalen Saunders Jersey Womens , it’s just disappointing. But, credit the Rams. They did a good job, made the plays in the end when they needed to.”Plays that wouldn’t have existed if Bill Vinovich’s crew got it right.An argument often is made, and rightly so, that plays seen in slow motion become clearly illegal, but at full speed in an increasingly fast and physical game, they look OK. That contention has no place here; even at warp speed, Robey-Coleman’s hit was obviously a penalty.NFL senior vice president of officiating Al Riveron “couldn’t believe” no penalty call was called on the play, Payton said.“It’s tough to get over it,” Payton said. “My problem with it is, I just don’t know, if we were playing pickup football in the backyard … it was as obvious a call — and how two guys can look at that and arrive at their decision? It happened though.”A few things happened in Kansas City, too, where the Patriots won 37-31, also in overtime. These had more to do with replay, with two critical calls going New England’s way in the fourth quarter.The first Khalen Saunders white jersey , which required a lengthy video review, involved Julian Edelman muffing a punt. The original call was that the bouncing ball touched him. Replays, even in stop motion, seemed inconclusive, which means the call should stand.But Riveron and his staff in New York saw enough evidence that Edelman never made contact with the football. Even Kansas City’s laid-back coach, Andy Reid, became highly demonstrative with the overturned decision. Who could blame him considering how many dozens of such calls stick with what on-field officials determined?The Chiefs, perhaps in a dose of poetic justice, soon after intercepted a pass that went off Edelman’s hands.But later in the quarter, Chris Hogan attempted a one-handed catch on third down. Reid challenged, and replay indicated far more evidence the ground helped Hogan make the catch than the previous review showed Edelman whiffed on the ball.No matter. The catch was upheld, and six plays later, Sony Michel scored a touchdown.Chiefs linebacker Dee Ford also went offside on the Patriots’ final drive in regulation, negating an interception by Charvarius Ward that could have clinched a win. But there was little controversy there.The league has been under heavy scrutiny and drawn massive criticism about its officiating in the last few years. The perception is that the NFL needs full-time officials, which might help somewhat, and in part is being done.However Khalen Saunders Kansas City Chiefs Jerseys , the deeper issues are too many rules and tangents to those rules; points of emphasis that get hammered in, then seemingly are discarded; and officials who struggle to keep up with the speed of the sport. The league prizes experience, but when one of its most experienced crews blows a call so blatant that even the perpetrator acknowledges he caught a break, the storm of protest will rage.Rightly so. Yes, the Los Angeles Rams got away with a flagrant foul (or two) by cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman that allowed them to sneak out of New Orleans with the NFC championship, right past the highway sign on the causeway over Lake Pontchartrain reading, “WE WERE ROBBED .”Yes, the Patriots won in Kansas City thanks to four critical calls going New England’s way in the fourth quarter, three of which were iffy: a replay reversal of Julian Edelman’s muffed punt , a phantom roughing-the-passer call on Chris Jones and Chris Hogan’s drive-sustaining one-handed catch with a little help from the ground.The fourth flag was indisputable: Dee Ford lined up in the neutral zone, negating rookie cornerback Charvarius Ward’s game-clinching interception with 55 seconds left and Kansas City ahead 28-24.“I thought the game was over,” Chiefs safety Daniel Sorensen said. “And it wasn’t.”Just like the Saints did when Tommylee Lewis blatantly was interfered with inside the Los Angeles 5-yard line by Robey-Coleman, whose helmet-to-helmet hit didn’t draw the flag but will surely result in a hefty fine.“I thought it was a flag for that split second,” acknowledged Robey-Coleman, who was as surprised as everyone else when two officials near the play ruled it an incomplete pass on third down with 1:45 remaining in regulation and the game tied at 20.“I knew if that had been a flag, they probably would have scored on the next play Kansas City Chiefs Jerseys 2019 ,” Robey-Coleman said.The call kept the Rams close as New Orleans settled for a field goal on the next play, Greg Zuerlein tied it in regulation with a 48-yarder and won it in overtime with a 57-yarder , two field goals that likely never would have happened had Robey-Coleman been flagged for clobbering Lewis well before the ball arrived.On Monday, Saints wide receiver Michael Thomas implored NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to undo the outcome of the game , citing an NFL rule that allows for “the reversal of a game’s result or the rescheduling of a game, either from the beginning or from the point at which the extraordinary occurred.”The league has never invoked the rule to reverse a game’s outcome.The George Halas and Lamar Hunt Trophies may be smudged amid the backlash over the officiating gaffes, but they aren’t entirely tarnished because strategy and execution had as much to do with the outcomes of these overtime thrillers as the yellow flags that were or weren’t thrown.The Rams (15-3) roared back from a pair of double-digit deficits to beat the Saints 26-23 in overtime because they stuck with the plan and didn’t panic after falling behind 13-0 in the first quarter and 20-10 in the third quarter.After managing just 5 yards in the first quarter when nothing went right, the Rams righted themselves thanks to a fake punt and cut New Orleans’ lead to 13-10 at halftime.“Our team demonstrated great mental toughness,” Rams coach Sean McVay said. “It was a tough start, but I thought the way (quarterback Jared Goff) played and handled the noise was outstanding.”The Rams outscored the Saints 16-3 down the stretch.The Patriots (13-5) overcame a 24-point fourth-quarter outburst fueled by Patrick Mahomes to beat the Chiefs 37-31 in overtime because Tom Brady was hardly touched, aside from Jones’ shoulder swipe that the officials thought hit him in the facemask.New England’s much-maligned offensive line didn’t allow a single sack to the Chiefs, whose 52 sacks during the regular season were tied with the Steelers for the league lead and who pummeled Andrew Luck a week earlier, sacking him three times.Brady “played great,” Patriots coach Bill Belichick said for what, the 1,000th time? “They were playing a lot of man coverage and it was either a good gain or an incompletion. … They gave us some three-man rush and there was a lot of four-man rush with Justin Houston Khalen Saunders black jersey , Chris Jones and Dee Ford. Those are tough matchups. I thought they did a good job of standing up to those guys and giving Tom a chance to deliver the ball.”In overtime, Brady, who has thrown 90 passes in the playoffs and has not been sacked a single time, converted a trio of third-and-10 pass plays on the winning touchdown drive.“Brady got rid of the ball fast,” Jones said. “We didn’t get to the quarterback like we usually do.”So the Patriots rushed for 176 yards and Brady threw for 348.By dominating the time of possession — 44 minutes to 21 minutes — Brady and the Patriots kept Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill on the sideline during most of the freezing night.“You play on the road, it is going to be tough,” Brady said. “What travels well is running the ball and playing tough. That is good in any weather, any condition, any environment and any stadium.”