By the way, this is at the heart of I think the phrase is terrible. For starters, rulings are what happens during play. Period. Sage Advice is providing a clarification of what the rules say. And if it can be ignored, if it doesn't actually apply, it's not official. Adventurers League can make official rules and the DMs and players are supposed to follow them.
For example:
1) By the official rules, the Saints should be playing in the Superbowl. But a ruling during the game changed that. It was a terrible ruling that pissed off a lot of people.
2) By the official rules, that Chiefs player was offside. The ruling during play was that his penalty cancelled the play that would have knocked out the Patriots. It was a good ruling that pissed off a lot of people.
WotC makes rules. The DM makes rulings.
And neither of them actually declare anything official because WotC ain't organizing my game, and I ain't pompous enough to describe what I do as "official."