NFL needs to hire full-time Refs

[signbabybrady]

By "the refs need to be full-time," are you saying "the refs shouldn't be allowed to hold any other jobs"? Even though the NFL season, including playoffs and exhibitions, only lasts half the year? And even though many of the officials' "day jobs" include refereeing college football -- experience that should make them BETTER at their NFL jobs?

I totally understand frustration with refereeing errors, but IMO the whole full-time angle is a red herring. They already earn six-figure salaries, and they already take their work very, very seriously. A full-time label won't change the fact that they're still fallible human beings.



Amen! It's ridiculous that this one penalty can so dwarf all others. They can still keep the current version for "flagrant fouls" to prevent out-and-out tackling of breakaway receivers.

I have been screaming this for years but the out and out tackle is usually not even a PI call its usually a holding call. Player gets beat at the line or the receivers first cut and grabs the receiver and/or pulls him down which usually occurs quickly and before the ball is in the air. So that excuse doesn't even work for me.

 

[patsfanincleveland]

Not clear to me how full time refs can compensate for the league's too subjective wording on PI and the unspoken directive to "just let them play" in the last 2 minutes of SOME games, which capriciousness exacerbates the situation. FT refs aren't gonna solve a schizoid competition committee. Clear, unambiguous rules with automatic booth review on PI would help a lot.

I have no solution for the random invocation or not of holding calls.

Add in the fact that these players are so big, extremely fast, and the game is so sophisticated.

Maybe extra officials might be needed.

 

[Lavictoire]

Part of the problem is so many players breaking the rules by pushing the envelope. Think about the speed limit when driving. Say the speed limit is 55 on a certain road.You are a cop watching a constant stream of traffic going 60 or 65. You sit there in frustration letting them all go by. You decide there is a certain speed you will not tolerate, say a car going 70 or 75.

The drivers who drive the daily commute feel safe driving 60 or 65, but one day a different cop is on duty and he feels he should not just let this wholesale lawbreaking occur and he will spend the day pulling random people over for going over 55. This will teach them to break the law, he says. The driver who gets pulled over feels betrayed because while driving over 55, he was not breaking the unspoken speed limit.

"Why don't they use a consistent standard" he fumes.

 

[DaBruinz]

We can only hope. He's the worst head referee in the league.

*ROFLMAO* You think Hochuli is worse than Jerome Bogar or Mike Carrey? Clearly you don't watch enough football.

Hochuli is one of the better head referees in the game. So is Gene Steratore.

 

[DaBruinz]

I have been a proponent of Full-Time Referees in the past. For many reasons. To help referees improve their understanding of the rules and game situations. I've felt they needed to be held accountable and that they needed to get rated by a Senior Official similar to the way the NHL does it. Well, I was enlightened by the 3 part series that Peter King did on Gene Steratore and his officiating crew. It turns out that every official DOES have a laptop from the league. And each individual member of the crew IS critiqued after every game and and each call is graded.

Peter King spends week embedded with NFL refs, Part 1 | The MMQB with Peter King
Peter King spends week embedded with NFL refs, Part 2 | The MMQB with Peter King
Game 150: The Test | The MMQB with Peter King

In theory, too many bad calls does get you eliminated from officiating in the play-offs and potentially terminated at the end of the year. Though, I know that Jerome Bogar is the exception. He had all his downgrades over-turned last year just prior to the play-offs despite the fact that he had 8 of them, including a couple of horrendous ones when he officiated the Pats games.

With that being said, I have to agree that the league rules need to as clearly defined as possible for the benefit of EVERYONE.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

*ROFLMAO* You think Hochuli is worse than Jerome Bogar or Mike Carrey? Clearly you don't watch enough football.

Hochuli is one of the better head referees in the game. So is Gene Steratore.

Hey -- Carey got the David Patten-head-OOB call right in 2001

The discussion of worst NFL official has to start and end with Moron Jeff Triplette.

 

[Joker]

active, yes I'd agree....but there really is only one that should have demanded full time ref status decades ago...BEN DREITH

 

[letekro]

Hey -- Carey got the David Patten-head-OOB call right in 2001

The discussion of worst NFL official has to start and end with Moron Jeff Triplette.

People blame Carey for what happened in SB 42. Overall, I don't think he is bad at all.

Triplette, on the other hand, is grossly incompetent.

 

[patfanken]

Well there might just be a decent compromise to the issue. Mike Perrera the former supervisor pf NFL officials made this suggestion. Make all the head refs fulltime, while the rest stay part time. Then you'd have a full time official on every crew who would be responsible for making sure his crew was properly prepared and accountable.

While I still don't think fulltime officials are necessary, this might defuse the issue.

 

[DaBruinz]

People blame Carey for what happened in SB 42. Overall, I don't think he is bad at all.

Triplette, on the other hand, is grossly incompetent.

Carrey admitted immediately after the game that he blew the call on the Immaculate reception to Tyree. He said he should have blown Manning down but didn't because he was "amazed that Manning was still standing" with those two guys on him..

 

[IcyPatriot]

My take is the same as it has been for a while ...

When we get to the final 4 teams ... usually it's the 4 that belong there regardless of the refs.

so in the big picture ... it's not going to change much to have full time refs.

for those that are anal regarding every stat and play
... might help them with their OCD a bit ... maybe :confused4:

If there are to be any changes ... let coaches dispute more stuff and add a timeout.

 

[pats4life12]

They have needed to do that for years but that takes out of the nfl's profits. So I'm willing to bet it won't happen.

 

[convertedpatsfan]

I think clearly there would be some value in added time to work on their craft but I think you would be pretty shocked to see the amount of time these guys already spend on their part time jobs. I remember they highlighted Hochuli once and he talked about what he goes through to prepare to be a ref and while it is technically part time there was nothing part time about it.

I think you also need to realize that Most refs get into it as side gig/hobby and only after years of doing it in Pop warner, high school, and college do they get a shot at the pros and obviously most need full time jobs then if they are the few who are considered good enough for the pros they are supposed to just quit their careers over some asinine idea that x amount of hours more will make them better I think it would deter a lot of good refs even with the money being equal or better to their career salaries.

I think for full time Refs to work the NFL would need to be more involved in the lower levels of the profession. Identifying candidates for the pros earlier in the process possibly right from the get go so that they can actually make this their one and only career otherwise every ref will have to chose whether to quit their first career to be an NFL ref. More money and benefits for them certainly could make this an easy choice but again using Hochuli as an example I believe he is either a judge or a lawyer and he may chose that over football.

Are you referencing this article? If so, it puts Hochuli at 10 hours a week. Sure, that's a lot for a part-time gig, but I would love to see that tripled as a full-time job.

I do realize that most refs start at lower levels as a side gig or hobby. In that article, Hochuli talked about how he started because he needed the $50 a game every Saturday morning. But at some point, it could be seen as a career, and maybe it should be that way.

A starting referee makes $78K, and 10-year veterans can make close to $200K. Maybe you don't get a lawyer like Hochuli, but I'm sure you could find some promising ref in the SEC or Big 10 willing to do it full-time for that kind of money. Let's say $150K plus 3 months vacation, who turns that down?

You could have a "practice squad" of younger referees to groom who make maybe $75K, hardly chump change, and more than many of these guys earn in their full-time jobs anyways.

I don't know if that's the exact answer, but I feel like there's a better one out there than the current one.

 

[JoeSixPat]

All I know is that if they have to work at Footlocker in between games, there's no way the NFL is paying them anywhere near enough.

 

[SalemPats]

The obvious fact is that the refereeing is not as good as it should be. The NFL makes a ton of money and if you want to have the best you must invest.

Why not hire these guys full-time and there week of a prep is actually a full week of prep. They study film, go through meetings, clarify rules, etc... The other leagues do that.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Someone asked Peter King this very question yesterday. Here's his response:

All but one of the officials on the crew felt that officials are nearly full-time anyway, seeing that they spend approximately 40 hours a week doing the prep work and meetings and film study for the job. I have a very strong opinion on this. I don’t think full-time officials would help much at all in trying to limit the number of mistakes NFL officials make. Most of the truly difficult calls in the NFL stem from big hits and physical contact that is so bang-bang that you really can’t tell what the exact call should be unless you watch it in slow motion. The only way to get experience in making calls like that is to make more plays like that. By going to a team practice everyday, for instance, what good would that do? Teams don’t practice at full-speed. Teams don’t have full contact during practice. I think the way to improve officiating is to continue to drill officials so that they don’t make the kind of bonehead mistakes we saw in the San Diego-Kansas City game. And if they do, I think officials should be suspended. That would drive the point home better than anything else.

 

[dhamz]

Full-time/part-time - irrelevant. The rules are the issue. The combination of Polian's mid 2000s rule changes in hopes of getting his team a ring and Godell's don't sue us safety measures of the last few years have made the game harder to call and it shows.

The rules become more complex every year. The most subjective calls - pass interference, hitting a defenseless WR, roughing the passer, and the like are also the most game changing with the most severe penatlies. There is no consistency play to play, series to series, never mind week to week. It has reached the point where no one - not players, not coaches, not fans, and not refs know exactly what should and shouldn't be called.

 

[PatsWickedPissah]

Full-time/part-time - irrelevant. The rules are the issue. The combination of Polian's mid 2000s rule changes in hopes of getting his team a ring and Godell's don't sue us safety measures of the last few years have made the game harder to call and it shows.

The rules become more complex every year. The most subjective calls - pass interference, hitting a defenseless WR, roughing the passer, and the like are also the most game changing with the most severe penatlies. There is no consistency play to play, series to series, never mind week to week. It has reached the point where no one - not players, not coaches, not fans, and not refs know exactly what should and shouldn't be called.

Bullseye!

OP et. al. jump to a "solution" without adequately defining the problem.

First off, the specific rules need review, rewrite and simplification.
Secondly, game changing impact calls like PI need booth review. We already have the field crew huddling and picking up flags. Why not have refs in the booth with access to replay make a more informed decision? TV can insert an ad while this goes on.
Thirdly, the BS of suddenly letting them play in the last 2 minutes or whatever has got to stop. It's gotta be called by the same set of criteria whenever its called.

This will help but not cure the core problem that fast paced action in real time exceeds human capabilities and that even after review human subjectivity can often yield two diametrically opposed outcomes. Just read this message board.

In the real world continuous incremental improvement should be the goal with perfection the ideal but recognized as unattainable.

 

[PatsSox363804]

Carrey admitted immediately after the game that he blew the call on the Immaculate reception to Tyree. He said he should have blown Manning down but didn't because he was "amazed that Manning was still standing" with those two guys on him..

To this day I still scream at the tv when he is making a call.

I don't care what else happens in the history of the NFL, "I was going to blow a play dead but didn't because I was amazed he was still up" to cost a team a friggin perfect season is ridiculous and he should have been fired for it. That's not even mentioning the blatant holds that prevented the sack from being completed that weren't called.

I'll always believe that Goodell told the refs to swallow the flags on that last drive.