Poor officiating Mars final drive at the Bengals-Ravens

Joe Burrow had good reason to frown tonight.

A passing performance of 428 yards, including 234 yards and three touchdowns for receiver Ja'Marr Chase, was wiped out by the officials' failure to call two clear fouls that would have started a two-point attempt.

Defensive hold, not called. Forced contact with Burrow's head, unknown.

Amazon Prime rules analyst Terry McAulay said both should have been called. And Al Michaels didn't hesitate to call BS as the no-calls had deprived the Bengals of another opportunity to score a two-point conversion that would have forced the Ravens to get within range for a potential game-winning field goal 38 seconds into the game before the end.

All too often, officials put their flags deeper into their pockets in such moments. But the rules are still the rules, and if the rules are broken, it shouldn't matter whether the foul occurred in the last or first minute of a game.

And it wasn't the only questionable official decision of the trip. As was the case during Vikings-Rams crunch time two weeks ago, the officials were missing a clear face mask from Burrow at the start of the drive. (Again, this is not subject to replay.) Then it appeared that a fourth-period attempt by the Bengals failed.

Since the drive started at the 30-yard line, the 40-yard line was essentially the goal line. And it appeared that receiver Andre Iosivas' knee was down before the ball reached the white stripe.

Was it some kind of makeup call for the missed face mask? Perhaps. Regardless, it looked like he didn't reach 40.

But the worst came in the two-point game. After the officials missed an apparent false start in the Buccaneers' overtime win over Jawaan Taylor at the hands of the Chiefs on Monday night, some in league circles raved about how poor the refereeing had become.

Based on what we saw tonight, no one can credibly say that NFL officiating is OK. Except in the sense of the cartoon dog in the burning room drinking coffee while inevitably on fire.