Saturday night’s overtime classic included a bizarre moment at the start of the extra session, with referee Clete Blakeman executing the rare non-flip flip of a coin.
The NFL has absolved Blakeman of any wrongdoing for his handling of the situation, which included not letting Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers change the call from tails to heads.
“There is nothing in the rule book that specifies [a required flip],” NFL spokesman Michael Signora said in a statement, via ESPN.com. “But the referee used his judgment to determine that basic fairness dictated that the coin should flip for the toss to be valid. That is why he re-tossed the coin.”
Yes, basic fairness requires a coin to flip for a coin flip to be regarded as a coin flip. And maybe if the coins they used weren’t the size of a manhole cover, maybe they would flip every time.