With about 5 minutes left in the fourth quarter against the Packers, the Jets completed a touchdown pass on fourth down to tie the game but it did not count because offensive coordinator Marty Mornhinweg called a time out and the ref blew the whistle before the snap.
Only head coaches are allowed to call time outs on the sideline, but the refs granted it for Mornhiweg anyway. Why would a ref do this? Former VP of officiating in the NFL and current rules analyst at Fox Sports says when it's late in the game you give a team a timeout without taking the time to look who's calling it:
If you get a last second timeout request (like in jets game), you grant it. You don't have time to turn around and see who is calling it.
— Mike Pereira (@MikePereira) September 14, 2014The quality isn't great here, but you can see Morhinweg calling the timeout:
Here's the play, the whistle had blown before the snap, but Geno Smith and co. didn't hear it:
Instead of tying the game with five minutes left, the Jets lost the game 31-24.
Jets fans everywhere will agree that "only the Jets" could pull something like this off. Though it's arguably still not as bad as the infamous butt fumble:
