The Baltimore Ravens lost a heartbreaker in the final seconds against the Kansas City Chiefs. While they fell short on the scoreboard, the Ravens did topple the Chiefs in penalties. They can thank a handful of illegal procedures for that.

Baltimore’s opening drive of the game, the very first drive of the entire NFL regular season, featured three illegal procedure penalties on the offensive line. Left tackle Ronnie Stanley was flagged twice and right tackle Patrick Mekari once for lining up too far off the line of scrimmage.

It’s a point of emphasis the league’s referees are trying to enforce, and they made the Ravens out to be an example of what not to do. Head coach John Harbaugh understands that, but what happens going forward is more important to him.

Harbaugh was asked about the illegal formations, of which there were five called against the Ravens throughout the night, and revealed that a memo detailing the point of emphasis was sent out prior to the game.

“They put a thing out that they said they were gonna call that differently,” Harbaugh told reporters after the game. “I think understanding how differently, we were the first offensive series of the season with that, and I think they saw probably everybody watching it.”

No one enjoys when the refs appear to make the game about themselves, but it was clear that the crew from Thursday night had a clear no-tolerance policy, at least when the Ravens possessed the ball. The Chiefs went the entire game without an illegal procedure blowing up a play for them.

Harbaugh recognized that the Ravens ended up as the guinea pig for a league-wide message. He also knows that consistency is key, and that’s ultimately up to the refs.

“It’ll be interesting to see if they call it the same way the whole season. I’ll challenge them to call it the same way they called it tonight the whole season. So hopefully they’ll be consistent about that.”

That one team was penalized five times for the infraction (four of them were charged to offensive linemen) and the other team was not is a bit fishy. 30 other teams are undoubtedly taking note and reinforcing the message to their own o-lines before the weekend gets underway.

The Ravens just had the tough luck of going out there first. If the frequency of the penalty decreases this weekend, Harbaugh will have good reason to feel slighted.