The play should have been dead, but the discourse is very much alive.In the second quarter of Jakob Johnson Jersey Saturday's Bengals-Raiders wild-card playoff matchup, Cincinnati's Joe Burrow to sed a touchdown pa s to Tyler Boyd that came with drama: a whistle was blown as the ball was in the air before it reached Boyd's hands, which may have indicated that a sprinting Burrow was out of bounds before the ball was thrown.After lots of confusion and a discu sion by the officials, the play stood and the touchdown counted, much to the dismay of the Raiders and their fans.By rule, an inadvertent ("erroneous" in the rulebook Joshuah Bledsoe Jersey ) whistle means that the play does not count and that the down should be replayed. Those are not things that the crew ruled on the field.MORE: Following the game, NFL senior vice president of officiating Walt Anderson tried to explain what exactly happened on the field, but instead he complicated the matter further:Pool report from : NFL Officiating (@NFLOfficiating) The main takeaway is that the officials believe the whistle was blown Boyd had po se sion. Anderson's explanation:They did not feel that the whistle was blown before the receiver caught the ball.Anderson also dodged a question about which official blew the Ja'Whaun Bentley Jersey whistle. When pre sed, he continued to dodge. It's important to note that a whistle being blown erroneously is not reviewable. That means that even though the scoring play Anfernee Jennings Jersey was reviewed (as all scoring plays are), the whistle would not have been a component of the review proce s.PLAYOFF BRACKET: It's also important to note that sound exists, and even though there may be a slight delay between what happened on-field and what came over the tube, the most telling thing is that some Raiders players seemed to think the play was dead while the ball was in the air.JOE BURR-WOW. : on NBC: NFL app NFL (@NFL) Two quarters and a Ronnie Perkins Jersey few more questionable calls later, the game came down to the wire, with the Bengals holding off the Raiders 26-19, punching their ticket to the divisional round next weekend.MORE: The officials may want get the heck out of Cincinnati faster.