@the-gipper said:

Its also possible that that penalty would not have been called had this not been the first game of the NFL season where the "regular" refs were back.

I think they wanted to assert their authority to a great degree. What better way than to pick on the most milktoast of the 32 NFL HCs.

A few games later into the season and that may not be called.

Fair to say?

That's a good point and it'll be interesting to see if anymore coaches get flagged this weekend.

@the-gipper said:

Its also possible that that penalty would not have been called had this not been the first game of the NFL season where the "regular" refs were back.

I think they wanted to assert their authority to a great degree. What better way than to pick on the most milktoast of the 32 NFL HCs.

A few games later into the season and that may not be called.

Fair to say?

For sure. I also read some people on a different board saying that a favored home team wins the prime time game an extremely high percentage of the time. I'm going to have to find the numbers on that, but those two calls really deflated a nice Browns drive.

@badnewsbrowns said:

He was arguing the intentional grounding call on Weeden, which you could say that the defender effected Weeden's throw but it's not like they're gonna change their minds.

Its also possible that that penalty would not have been called had this not been the first game of the NFL season where the "regular" refs were back.

I think they wanted to assert their authority to a great degree. What better way than to pick on the most milktoast of the 32 NFL HCs.

A few games later into the season and that may not be called.

Fair to say?