As the Divisional Round showdown between the Buffalo Bills and the Denver Broncos ended with one disputed officiating decision, it sent NFL legend Terrell Owens into a full-blown fury. The Bills had their chance to win in overtime as their quarterback, Josh Allen, launched a deep pass to Brandin Cooks. While it appeared that the wide receiver had secured the catch, the officials ruled it an interception. That call ended Buffalo’s season, and a day later, Owens claimed that the refs made an error.

“10000000% The @BuffaloBills got straight HOSED by the @NFLOfficiating!!!” Owens wrote in an X post on January 18. “I swear I feel so bad for the Bills organization for what they’ve had to endure over the years but to have the refs to make that decision is not only unbelievable but unacceptable. These refs may need to be investigated. #realtalk.”

To back up his point, Owens quoted a post from Dave Myers, host of the Built in Buffalo Podcast.

“Per the #NFL rule book. This goes to the offense. The play is over when touched down. Knee is down, contact made,” Myers wrote in the X post.

Myers leaned directly on the NFL rule book as he argued that the call should have gone Buffalo’s way. He even posted a screenshot showing Brandin Cooks’ knee down during the play. It happened in overtime on third-and-11 from Buffalo’s 36-yard line when Josh Allen connected with Cooks.

The screenshot showed how Cooks had the ball in his hand when he went down as Broncos cornerback Ja’Quan McMillian tried to take it away.

But what the picture did not show was that McMillian popped up with the ball after both players landed. As such, the officials ruled it an interception, but replays sure made it look messy. Cooks clearly had possession. Shouldn’t that have ended the play? Still, because part of the ball was also tangled in McMillian’s arms, officials chose not to overturn the call after review. Referee Carl Cheffers later explained the decision to a pool of reporters. 

“The receiver has to complete the process of a catch,” Cheffers said. “He was going to the ground as part of the process of the catch, and he lost possession of the ball when he hit the ground. The defender gained possession of it at that point. The defender is the one that completed the process of the catch, so the defender was awarded the ball.”

But Cheffers’ explanation did not stop the debate.

Soon, the controversy reached former NFL Vice President of Officiating Walt Anderson, who then addressed it on NFL GameDay. Anderson explained that, according to the NFL rules, while a receiver is going to the ground, if the ball comes loose and hits the turf, it will be an incomplete pass.

But the ball never hit the ground with Brandin Cooks. Anderson pointed out that the loose ball immediately ended up in McMillian’s control. Since McMillian rolled over and maintained possession, the officials ruled it an interception. 

So, Terrell Owens’ call for an investigation did not come out of nowhere.

Last year in the Divisional Round game, when the Kansas City Chiefs benefited from several calls against the Houston Texans, Owens believed officials were helping the Chiefs. There were also controversial calls in the AFC Championship Game against the Bills. Now, even with the Chiefs out of the picture, Buffalo still found itself on the wrong side of a huge decision.

Did the refs show a lack of transparency with Josh Allen’s team?

When Josh Allen was asked after the loss whether the refs explained the Brandin Cooks’ call to him, his answer was brutally simple: “No.”

Josh Allen’s one-word response made it clear that there was no clarity or transparency in the way that the refs handled the situation with the Bills. And all of it came in the biggest moment of the season for the franchise. If officials had ruled it a catch, the Bills would have been in easy field-goal range. They could’ve gone up 33-30 and walked out with a win. Instead, the play was recorded as Allen’s second interception of the night.

Then things snowballed quickly for the Bills after that disputed call. Two pass-interference penalties on Buffalo handed Denver 47 yards. As Denver’s offense then got the ball at Buffalo’s 8-yard line, they ultimately kicked the game-winning field goal.

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After the loss, Bills head coach Sean McDermott was clearly frustrated with the refs.

“Obviously, I don’t have the power to challenge,” McDermott said in the press conference after the game. “We’re in overtime. The flag is not an option to throw it down, so I called a timeout to try and get the process to slow down because it seemed like the process was not slowing down. Seemed like a rapid unfolding of the review, if there was a review.

“It would make sense that the head official would walk over and take a look at it, just to make sure that everybody was on the same page,” McDermott added. “It was too big a play that decided the game. But [the review] was not slowed down.”

Sean McDermott had no real recourse. And the refs made a call that favored the Los Angeles Rams.

The refs later made a different call on the same play that got the Bills eliminated

Late in the first half of the Divisional Round game against the Chicago Bears, Rams’ QB Matthew Stafford connected with his receiver Davante Adams on a second-and-ten. Adams briefly caught the ball before a Bears defender ripped it out of his hands. This time, officials ruled it a catch for Adams and killed the play. The similarities were hard to ignore between the two game-changing moments involving the Rams’ and the Bills’ receivers.

“This is an embarrassment for the NFL,” Jay Skurski of The Buffalo News wrote on X by quoting a clip that showed Adams’ catch. “It’s the same play as last night and these network ‘rules experts’ make things worse. They’re contradicting themselves, or worse, posting polls about season-defining plays when they’re supposed to be the authorities on what actually happened.”

The argument in Davante Adams’ case is that he may have gotten a step or two in while catching the ball before his knee hit the ground. Brandin Cooks, meanwhile, went straight down with his knee while catching the ball. 

Ultimately, amidst all the finger-pointing at the refs, Bills right tackle Spencer Brown acknowledged that Denver’s smart late-game plan also led to the Bills’ loss. And let’s not forget that the Broncos scored 16 points off five Buffalo turnovers that came throughout the game. So, while the controversial call will be debated, the Bills also hurt themselves with a performance that crushed their Super Bowl dreams.