The Chiefs and Ravens will meet in the AFC championship on Sunday for the right to go to Super Bowl 58. While Baltimore is the favorite to win the matchup, some NFL fans are worried the league is trying to stack the letters in favor of Kansas City. .
The Chiefs have drawn more attention than any other NFL team this season. That makes sense considering they are the reigning Super Bowl champions and have Patrick Mahomes at quarterback.
However, the recognition Kansas City has received is not always due to its performance on the field. It’s because the team has the most notable celebrity fan this season in Taylor Swift.
Swift went public with her relationship with Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce in the early days of the 2023 NFL season. Since then, the pop star has consistently attended Kansas City games and has frequently appeared on the broadcast when he attends.
The NFL has benefited greatly from Swift’s presence. Their fans, known as “Swifties”, have become interested in the sport because of this. It remains to be seen whether they are watching games just to catch a glimpse of Swift or because they have become football fans, but either way, viewership has increased.
As such, many believe that the NFL would like to see the Chiefs make it to the Super Bowl, as Swift’s attendance at the event may make it the most-watched Super Bowl in NFL history.
How much would the league want that to happen? A subset of NFL fans believe the league’s assignment of referees for the game is indicative of a conspiracy favoring the Chiefs.
Taylor Swift conspiracy theory, explained
The so-called “Taylor Swift conspiracy” arose because the NFL assigned veteran official Shawn Smith as the referee for Sunday’s AFC championship game.
Smith has been an NFL official since 2015 and was promoted to referee prior to the 2018 NFL season. He certainly is a qualified referee, as evidenced by his selection to a postseason team, a right reserved only for the league’s best and brightest.
That said, Smith has favored the away team at a surprisingly high rate in recent seasons. Home teams have won only 40.8 percent of the games Smith has coached over the past three seasons, according to Warren Sharp of Sharp football analysis. Home teams overall have won an average of 55.4 percent of NFL games over that same span.
Because of these skewed numbers, Smith ranks No. 1 among referees in road win percentage since his debut as a referee in 2018. The numbers from the 2023 season show that he has, in fact, favored the away team, at least when It’s about summoning. sanctions.
Smith’s teams have called the seventh-most penalties per game this season with a mark of 12.19, according to data from NFLReferees.com. Those penalties have been imposed on the home team 53.32 percent of the time, a mark that ranks third highest in the NFL behind Clay Martin (56.32 percent) and Craig Wrolstad (53.54 percent).
All of that would apparently benefit the Chiefs, which is why Swift’s name has been linked to the conspiracy. In her creator’s mind, the decision to name Smith as referee has to do with ensuring she and the Chiefs are in Las Vegas at the end of the game.
Of course, that’s not the whole story. It should be noted that Smith usually had to work in games in which the home team was at a disadvantage. The overall record of teams playing at home in their games this season was 117-155, good for a .430 winning percentage. Meanwhile, road teams during the season went 152-120, good for a .559 winning percentage.
With that in mind, Smith’s home team’s winning percentage doesn’t seem all that skewed.
That still hasn’t stopped NFL fans from wondering if Smith’s assignment was made to favor the Chiefs. After all, what better way to give the Chiefs a slight advantage than to give a respected but slightly pro-visitor referee the opportunity to officiate the game?
The conspiracy is only strengthened by the fact that Clete Blakeman was granted the other mission. Only 47.99 percent of his penalties have been called against the home team this season, a middling mark compared to Smith’s top three ranking.
Still, that’s all this talk is: a conspiracy. theory. If the Chiefs manage to win or stay close and there are some questionable decisions, then maybe there’s something to it.
If the Ravens can handle the Chiefs with relative ease or the referees remain out of sight, out of mind for most of the contest, then it will be clear that there was nothing underhanded about this officiating assignment.
