Is Chiefs’ Jawaan Taylor being targeted by league? Ex-NFL VP of officiating weighs in
Chiefs coach Andy Reid made a point Monday of saying game officials should be focused where all NFL tackles are lined up, not just Jawaan Taylor.
After the Chiefs’ 41-10 over the Bears on Monday, quarterback Patrick Mahomes also spoke out about the flags on Taylor.
“It’s hard because he’s playing great football, and he’s getting these penalties thrown on him and I know it’s hard to officiate,” Mahomes said.
“But I watch a lot of tape and he’s no deeper than any other tackle in the league. I mean there’s other guys even further back than he is. It’s crazy to see and hopefully it kind of calms down as the season goes on.”
But Dean Blandino, the Fox Sports rules analyst who was the NFL’s Vice President of Officiating from 2013-17, defended officials.
Blandino noted an official will warn tackles before throwing a flag.
“There’s no question that he was too far back; you’ve got to break the belt line of the snapper. And he was too far back,” Blandino said on the 33rd Team Podcast. “Patrick Mahomes touched on the issue when he said that he watches a ton of film and he doesn’t think that Jawaan Taylor’s lined up any further back than other tackles. I can’t say that Patrick Mahomes is wrong when he says he watches a ton of film and sees other tackles because here’s the deal: We had five illegal formation calls in Week 3 so far; three were for different violations, maybe a receiver covering up another eligible receiver. There were only two illegal formations for a tackle not lining up on the line of scrimmage.
“And that’s right: the only two were against our guy Jawaan Taylor, and look, you can look at a lot of film. Is this something that the league has to continue to emphasize? And it’s not just one player. It’s all tackles; they got to be up on the ball. We’ll see. We’ll see if this continues to be (an issue).”
Here is the clip.
