Another NFL Season, Another Laughable Amount Of Kansas City Chiefs Calls And Non-Calls. This Time Backed Up With Published Scientific Journal Research From UTEP

NBC El Paso - During the past eight or nine years, many football fans have wondered: Is the NFL favoring the Kansas City Chiefs? Why do Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs always seem to get bailed out with a penatly flag against the other team?

No, you are not being paranoid or a delusional. Actually, science and research suggest you might be on to something.

Research done by a team at UTEP presents evidence that the Chiefs have benefited from slanted officiating from 2015 to 2023, a time that coincided with their rise as one of the NFL’s most marketable franchises.

Published in the journal Financial Review, the study provides “one of the clearest empirical looks at how financial pressures can influence real-time rule enforcement,” the UTEP research team said.

“Our findings suggest that when the league’s financial health is at stake, rule enforcement may subtly shift to protect market appeal,” said Spencer Barnes Ph.D., assistant professor of finance in UTEP’s Woody L. Hunt College of Business and the lead author of the study. “The fact that postseason penalties consistently favored one franchise, while similar dynasties showed no such pattern, points to the powerful role of financial incentives in shaping supposedly neutral decisions.”

The study shows that during the playoffs, which the research team identified as the NFL’s most commercially valuable period, penalties against opposing defenses of the Chiefs’ offense were significantly more likely to result in first downs, cover more yardage and fall into subjective categories such as roughing the passer or pass interference.

Ho hum. Another Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce season, another season of crooked officiating. This comes as zero surprise to anybody with two-eyeballs who's watched an NFL game over the last 7-8 years. 

Literally...

This, Spencer said, may be the result of financial pressures on the league stemming from the sharp decline in TV viewership and ratings during 2015–2017 seasons, just before Mahomes became the Chiefs’ starting quarterback. Those seasons were marked by controversy over racial issues, most notably San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneeing during the national anthem to protest police brutality and racism.

The implications extend beyond football, the research team says. The study draws parallels to financial markets, corporate governance and regulatory agencies, where dominant players may enjoy advantages not because of explicit corruption, but because institutions under pressure adapt to preserve stability and revenue.

“This research not only deepens our understanding of sports governance, but also illustrates a larger societal concern: When financial pressure weighs heavily, impartiality can erode,” said John Hadjimarcou, Ph.D., dean of UTEP’s Woody L. Hunt College of Business. “Spencer’s work demonstrates the power of academic inquiry to reveal hidden dynamics that affect fairness, competition and trust in institutions.”

Even your wives and daughters, who now tune in to Chiefs games because of the future Travis Swift's wife in attendance, have to be able to watch the game and say, "wow, the Chiefs sure do enjoy quite an advantage compared to their competition."

And if you wanna argue with this, just know that you're arguing with science. This is no longer opinion. It's published, scientific journal, fact. 

And for the Chiefs apologists who love to disregard this blatant, damning evidence, and put the finger at Patriots fans and cry- "Brady and New England got the same treatment", all me to point out - 

Importantly, these effects were absent from the Tom Brady–era New England Patriots and other recent Super Bowl contenders, suggesting the phenomenon is unique to Kansas City’s emergence as a television ratings powerhouse, the study found.

I'm not here to gloat though. I'm here to throw up my hands and sigh, because I, like a lot of people out there, continue to financially punish myself by not adhering to what's staring up dead in the face. 

The biggest lock of the last ten years was this past Sunday night's game. 

There was a negative infinity chance that the NFL was going to allow its figurehead franchise, the Kansas City Chiefs, to fall to 2-4. Especially at home. Especially in prime time. 

(Sidebar- do the Chiefs just play in primetime every week now? It's fucking insanity.)

For anybody watching that game, it wasn't anything we aren't used to by now, or haven't grown accustomed to. Just your usual ridiculousness-

And even if you find the biggest Chiefs-fan, Mahomes and Reid Kool-Aid drinker in the world, I'm sure they'd yell that "it goes both ways". 

Except that, it doesn't really. 

Last week, the Chiefs were flagged for a franchise-high 13 penalties, their most in eight seasons. This week, KC had ZERO penalties called on them. There have been almost 100 games played this year, and it hadn’t happened in a single one.

And listen, I'm not a hater. I genuinely want to like Patrick Mahomes. He's a generational talent, freak athlete, who also seems like a very good teammate and person. There's nothing not to like. But he just makes it so hard. 

That's straight-up punk shit. 

You can't talk trash and run your mouth when you've got the refs legitimately having your back and calling everything they can come up with against your opponent, and looking the other way on your shit. 

Especially considering that…

It's out of fucking control, but here's the thing; it's been out of fucking control for a long time now. Somewhere in the underworld, Roger Goodell smiles.

Steven. Shutterstock Images.