The NFL has an officiating problem. It’s time for the NFL to figure it out.
The NFL is not about the league office. That is, the owner.
It’s their game. their sport. They have invested and continue to maintain billions of dollars in this sport. They are sports. The whole concept of a league office with a commissioner carrying out his orders provides a big shield behind which owners can hide individually.
It’s time to stop hiding. Officiating will only improve if the owner takes charge of the process.
That in itself is not a civil servant issue. The middle-aged men and women who do this job do the best they can, maneuvering in and around the gladiators without the benefit of pads or helmets. Things happen at lightning speed, and authorities look and make their best decisions in real time.
There are examples every week. Multiple instances of horrible calls occurred on the final drive of the game on Sunday night, from a horrible unnecessary roughness call calling for a hit on Patrick Mahomes to a horrible non-call of pass interference to the latest application of a non-existent Hail Mary did. Exception to the pass interference rule.
There is a need to dismantle and reconsider the function of the moderator. Listed in late October 5 reasons why the NFL won’t do it: (1) Cheap. (2) Laziness. (3) Incompetence. (4) Controversy sells. (5) There is no urgency to change.
An emergency will arrive when Congress makes it happen. Anyone who thinks this view is chicken fanfiction has either forgotten about the October 2009 Congressional Hearing or doesn’t know about it at all. In that session, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and NFL Players Association Executive Director DeMaurice Smith learned that if pro football doesn’t clean up the mess surrounding head injuries, Congress will.
This hearing sparked a revolution in player safety that continues to this day. If Congress does the same thing when it comes to gambling, focusing on disgusting and vulgar officiating, the league will do the same.
It’s tempting to just wait for the cage to rattle. That’s bad for the game. For the integrity of the game. This phrase is quoted when the league office tries to protect the league by punishing someone. It is never talked about as a desire or a goal.
It should be. This is not a catchphrase that justifies suspension or termination. It’s a mission statement. If you become an officer, your mission will fail.
As one head coach explained to PFT on Monday, it’s[t]The owner must manage it. The coach suggested that Goodell, competition committee chairman Rich McKay and NFL vice president of football operations Troy Vincent be removed from the equation entirely.
He also agrees that the league needs to “completely overhaul” its officiating process. I’ve said for years that we need to tear it down and rebuild it, taking into account all the technology available.
What the NFL should do, and what it will never do, is call Fox Sports rules analyst (and former NFL senior vice president of officiating) Dean Blandino and ask him to give him a price. Blandino himself said the league doesn’t properly evaluate vice presidents of officiating. It is critical to the long-term success of the league and the short-term integrity of the game.
What do you need? What should I take? Given the importance of this job to the NFL, and all the gambling money the league currently has in its pockets, paying $10 million a year to fix officiating functions would be a reasonable price to pay.
Unless major changes occur, the inevitable scandals will be costly. a lot More than that.