Tom Brady Candidly Questioned Officiating in Packers-Lions

Tom Brady didn’t hold back on referees while calling the Packers-Lions game on Sunday, strongly questioning several officiating calls in the second half. 

Brady’s criticism was notable—not in the sense that he was wrong about the referees missing a number of significant calls, but because as a minority owner of the Raiders he is subject to a roving electrical fence about what is and isn’t allowed in his commentary for Fox Sports. 

Late in the fourth quarter, Packers defensive tackle Karl Brooks was flagged for roughing the passer and Brady couldn’t believe it. “No, my goodness! What is that? Brooks kind of makes a great play—that’s definitely not roughing the passer! … You can’t keep tacking on 15 yards.” 

This was one of multiple instances where Fox brought in officiating expert Dean Blandino to back Brady up. “It wasn’t late. They might have said head-neck area, but this is not head-neck area … This is teach-tape tackle. That’s not roughing the passer,” Blandino said. 

On an earlier roughing-the-passer penalty on Green Bay defensive end Brenton Cox Jr., in the third quarter, Brady said that it was “not much at all.”

“He’s coming off the block. His face is buried. I don’t know about that. That’s a tough one,” Brady said of the call that extended a possession for the Lions when they would have otherwise been forced to punt. 

Blandino concurred that “you really want to see more force there … I don’t like that as roughing.” 

On a delayed intentional grounding call to start the fourth quarter on Packers quarterback Jordan Love, Brady and play-by-play announcer Kevin Burkhardt were initially confused about what the flag was for, speculating that it could be for too many men in the huddle. 

Burkhardt then asked if they called grounding, and said that “Tucker Kraft was right there” in the area of where Love threw the ball. When they showed the replay, Brady said it was “certainly in the direction” of Kraft and “definitely not grounding … they really missed that call.” Burkhardt called the flag “crazy.” On the next Lions possession, after a commercial break, Blandino agreed with their analysis. The call made it so the Packers faced 2nd and 21 deep in their own territory as opposed to a more manageable 2nd and 10. 

It wasn’t just calls against the Packers that Brady took issue with. He thought that there was “no way” Lions linebacker Derrick Barnes deserved to be flagged for unnecessary roughness. “He’s just turning his head away from it,” Brady said. “That’s allowed 99 out of 100 times.” 

The Lions beat the Packers 20–17.

When Brady first started as an announcer for Fox in 2024, ESPN’s Seth Wickersham detailed the restrictions the seven-time Super Bowl champion faced, as a partial team owner, in his commentary, which included criticism of the referees. 

Wickersham wrote that Brady “would be prohibited from publicly criticizing game officials and other clubs. While Brady could, in theory, state that he disagrees with a call on air, he would be subject to fines or even a suspension if he went too far.”

It could be argued that Brady stayed on the straight-and-narrow in this game, because each disagreement focused on a discrete play as opposed to stitching it all together in a way that would have alleged the referees lost control of the game. Fox also assisted Brady by bringing in Blandino each time to back him up.

An NFL spokesperson told FOS earlier this year, in the context of a story about Troy Aikman having similar rules given he was working with the Dolphins front office, that “there have been no issues with Tom over the last two seasons.” 

The rules have also been “relaxed” since he started announcing two-plus seasons ago, The Athletic reported last year, noting that he was newly able to attend production meetings at teams’ discretion, which had previously been restricted. 

A spokesperson for Fox declined to comment and the NFL did not immediately respond to a request for comment.