NFL seems to displease fans with officiating. What ideas do fans have to improve it?

[Chaos]

 A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, NFL football cames did not have instant replay. And somehow the league functioned.  Mistakes were made, and people were annoyed, but they were accepted as part of the game. High School football is able to operate still without instant replay.  

 

In theory I like instant replay.  But I feel like in many games now I am watching an episode of CSI-NFL as plays are disected frame by frame, Gene Steradore is brought in to give his opinion and even then, there are a fair number of plays were people simply disagree on the meaning of what they are seeing. 

 

My observation is the most controversial aspect of officiating is not the penalties that are called, its the penalties that are missed.  For example, the hold at the end of the Super Bowl that resulted in the Chiefs being able to run out the clock was clearly a hold by the rules. But fans instantly railed against the inconsistency of applying that rule, point out how many times during the game more aggregiouos penalties had been missed. This leads to my first suggestion: 

 

1. There needs to be the ability for teams to call for instant replay for a missed penalty.  Initially this will painfully slow games because so many holds in current games are missed but eventually players will adapt.  If they know that they will always get called for holds, they will stop holding, or be replaced by players that can play without holding. 

 

The next thing I dislike about instant replay is that it adds a gameship element to Football that does not belong. Teams running up to the line to beat the review, home teams showing 10 angles of some plays on thier big screen, while not showing any replays of some other ones, or befuffled coaches not know whether to risk a time out or not being put under the gun.  I would rather the outcomes of games be decided between the lines. The leads to my second suggestion.

 

      2.  Refs should have the ability to rule "could not determine" on a play.  One element of the frustration with instant replay is it requires over turning a mistake. In many instances, it seems clear (particularly with regards to whether a ball was caught or not) where the ref just did not have a good view of the call.  Let them throw a blue flag, asking for a review, to get the call right in the first place, rather than force the coach who to decide if the ref's guess was right or wrong.  This allows the standard to be changed from "overruling with incontrovertible evidence" to "lets just make the right call".  Good refs should have to throw this hypthetical blue flag only a couple of times a season. It should not be some sort of crutch.  But this means only 1 call is made on the play rather than two calls on reversals. 

 

I think both of the changes would remove much of the frustration with NFL officiating.  It seems as though it has to be better than the current system of expecting refs to be "consistenly wrong" and "guessing" when they don't have the proper angle. 

 

Edited February 14, 2023 by Chaos

[Dancing Fool]

Personally I have stopped investing emotionally in games that seem to be influenced by Las Vegas. This seems WAY more productive than looking for solutions for something that the NFL does not seem to view as a problem.

 

Has the NFL indicated that they wish to change anything about how refs function? If they have not then I will presume that officiating is working as it is intended to.

Edited February 14, 2023 by Dancing Fool

[zow2]

Any holding that is offensive or defensive that is far away from the actual play.  I'm talking like the other side of the field, should be ignored.  That includes special teams.  If a flag is thrown, the refs should pick it up.

Edited February 14, 2023 by zow2

[papazoid]

#1- full time refs, year round training

 

speeding up the review process should be #2

 

both very doable 

[DaBillsFanSince1973]

[Lost]

Allow the teams 1 penalty challenge per half.   If the ref gets the call wrong he's ejected.

[PetermansRedemption]

Same solution I’ve been peddling for years.

1. Everything is challengeable and coaches only get two the entire game. No getting a third if you win two, just two total. 

2. Plays are reviewed in real time. If it isn’t obvious in real time, it isn’t obvious. 
3. There is a “shot clock” of 2-3 minutes. If there isn’t a reversal by then, the call on the field stands. 

Edited February 14, 2023 by PetermansRedemption

[Dr. Who]

9 minutes ago, Lost said:

Allow the teams 1 penalty challenge per half.   If the ref gets the call wrong he's ejected.

You'd have to have a pool of spare refs for every game. The idea of accountability for bad calls is supposedly part of the review process, but skepticism is in order.

[May Day 10]

11 minutes ago, PetermansRedemption said:

Same solution I’ve been peddling for years.

1. Everything is challengeable and coaches only get two the entire game. No getting a third if you win two, just two total. 

2. Plays are reviewed in real time. If it isn’t obvious in real time, it isn’t obvious. 
3. There is a “shot clock” of 2-3 minutes. If there isn’t a reversal by then, the call on the field stands. 

 

Some version of this would be fine IMO.

 

 

Its an unpopular take, but I think NFL games are very well officiated.  Its an impossible job and these guys do it as well as humanly possible.  Mistakes happen, its the human element and part of sports.

[What a Tuel]

The biggest problem isnt that they called the holding. They called it right. The problem is that they didn't call probably 20 other holdings of the same nature earlier in the game. They magnify big moments through inconsistency which makes fans unhappy.

Edited February 14, 2023 by What a Tuel

[Uncle Buck]

Simplify the rule book - Formation penalties, etc are a waste of time. Intentional grounding is obvious, who cars about the tackle box and whether the ball got to the line of scrimmage. There are countless other technical penalties that could be eliminated to focus on the stuff that really changes games. 

[Bleeding Bills Blue]

18 minutes ago, What a Tuel said:

The biggest problem isnt that they called the holding. They called it right. The problem is that they didn't call probably 20 other holdings of the same nature earlier in the game. They magnify big moments through inconsistency which makes fans unhappy.

 

I didn't appreciate which ref threw it. i felt he had the worst view of it.... someone in his ear perhaps?!!! Conspiracy! 

[KDIGGZ]

Prison rules. If there's no blood then there's no foul

[SinceThe70s]

40 minutes ago, PetermansRedemption said:

Same solution I’ve been peddling for years.

1. Everything is challengeable and coaches only get two the entire game. No getting a third if you win two, just two total. 

2. Plays are reviewed in real time. If it isn’t obvious in real time, it isn’t obvious. 
3. There is a “shot clock” of 2-3 minutes. If there isn’t a reversal by then, the call on the field stands. 

 

I think #2 would be the best next step. There are always going to be plays where two people view the same play differently. In the end we take time out from game play to do a Zapruder-like investigation that as often than not many think they got it wrong.. View the replay in real-time and if it's not obvious, let the call on the field stand and move on. 

[RalphWilson'sNewWar]

Maybe watching for it more this season… but I just happened to notice more make up calls in the NFL this season in more games that I may have ever notice before in the past.

 

Evers since the Raiders/Chiefs night game when Kansas got robbed on the QB Hit and refs turned around and had to fix their mistakes.

 

I don’t know how I feel about that honestly because if a ref screws yiu in the first quarter, and it leads to the game goong in one direction, maybe the refs should give you a make up call later in the game to balance things out.

[BillsFanNC]

The NFL has no motivation or need to fix any of this until the public stops consuming their product en masse.

 

Since that isn't going happen its just going to be wash, rinse, repeat.

[Simon]

Three easy steps:

 

1) Every official starts the game with three flags in his pocket. If you run out of flags, you are done for the day. If you run out of flags two weeks in a row, you don't get paid. If you run out of flags three weeks in a row, you are done for the year.

 

2) Every official wears a proximity sensor with a mild shock device wired into their skivvies. If you come within 10 feet of two other officials simultaneously during a dead ball, you get shocked.

 

3) All coaches challenges are removed. The replay system consists of one neutral fan upstairs in a room with a cooler full of beer and 8 large monitors with quick replay capability of all camera angles in the stadium. This person has until the ball is snapped on the next down to decide whether to overturn a call on the previous play. If they cannot find a camera angle clearly showing the need for a reversal in that time frame, play moves on. If they do see an obvious need for a reversal, they buzz down to the head ref to stop the play and clarify the call. NOT to have the ref go squint into a single tiny hooded monitor for 5 minutes to decide, but to tell them where the ball is, what the down and distance are and what the clock says, at which time the play clock is rest and play moves on.

 

Fast, efficient and minimizes officiating impact on the game

 

 

[Marcus Aurelius]

Start watching the WNBA?

[HOUSE]

We need more honest players, if you f***  up...... just admit it.

[Ridgewaycynic2013]

10 minutes ago, HOUSE said:

We need more honest players, if you f***  up...... just admit it.

"First, we get the honest guy...then, we get HOUSE!"

[dpberr]

Referees should be full-time, with year round support.  In the offseason, they are working USFL games and studying the game.

 

Building a back bench/pipeline of officiating staff is yet another benefit of the NFL establishing some sort of minor league system. 

[Bob Jones]

34 minutes ago, Simon said:

Three easy steps:

3) All coaches challenges are removed. The replay system consists of one neutral fan upstairs in a room with a cooler full of beer and 8 large monitors with quick replay capability of all camera angles in the stadium. This person has until the ball is snapped on the next down to decide whether to overturn a call on the previous play. If they cannot find a camera angle clearly showing the need for a reversal in that time frame, play moves on. If they do see an obvious need for a reversal, they buzz down to the head ref to stop the play and clarify the call. NOT to have the ref go squint into a single tiny hooded monitor for 5 minutes to decide, but to tell them where the ball is, what the down and distance are and what the clock says, at which time the play clock is rest and play moves on.

I know you're being half serious here, but you're not that far off with this one. And it seems that, in some games, I have actually seen where the "guy in the booth upstairs" used his power to correct/overrule the refs down on the field (without the ref on the field stopping the game and going over to look at the monitor under the hood). It didn’t happen too often, but I'm pretty sure I've seen this guy upstairs get involved, and it was even in non-playoff, regular season games.

 

My take would be to have a guy upstairs, like you describe, to definitely get involved in ALL close calls, and buzz the on field ref ASAP if need to be, to correct. Like you said, that guy should be part of the officiating crew, so there's never a need for the on field ref to go look at a tiny monitor. I surmise that currently, the guy upstairs is actually making the call, since he probably has a 65 inch monitor to see the play clearly, while the on field guy is looking at a what, 12 inch screen?

[JohnNord]

2 hours ago, Chaos said:

 A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, NFL football cames did not have instant replay. And somehow the league functioned.  Mistakes were made, and people were annoyed, but they were accepted as part of the game. High School football is able to operate still without instant replay.  

 

In theory I like instant replay.  But I feel like in many games now I am watching an episode of CSI-NFL as plays are disected frame by frame, Gene Steradore is brought in to give his opinion and even then, there are a fair number of plays were people simply disagree on the meaning of what they are seeing. 

 

My observation is the most controversial aspect of officiating is not the penalties that are called, its the penalties that are missed.  For example, the hold at the end of the Super Bowl that resulted in the Chiefs being able to run out the clock was clearly a hold by the rules. But fans instantly railed against the inconsistency of applying that rule, point out how many times during the game more aggregiouos penalties had been missed. This leads to my first suggestion: 

 

1. There needs to be the ability for teams to call for instant replay for a missed penalty.  Initially this will painfully slow games because so many holds in current games are missed but eventually players will adapt.  If they know that they will always get called for holds, they will stop holding, or be replaced by players that can play without holding. 

 

The next thing I dislike about instant replay is that it adds a gameship element to Football that does not belong. Teams running up to the line to beat the review, home teams showing 10 angles of some plays on thier big screen, while not showing any replays of some other ones, or befuffled coaches not know whether to risk a time out or not being put under the gun.  I would rather the outcomes of games be decided between the lines. The leads to my second suggestion.

 

      2.  Refs should have the ability to rule "could not determine" on a play.  One element of the frustration with instant replay is it requires over turning a mistake. In many instances, it seems clear (particularly with regards to whether a ball was caught or not) where the ref just did not have a good view of the call.  Let them throw a blue flag, asking for a review, to get the call right in the first place, rather than force the coach who to decide if the ref's guess was right or wrong.  This allows the standard to be changed from "overruling with incontrovertible evidence" to "lets just make the right call".  Good refs should have to throw this hypthetical blue flag only a couple of times a season. It should not be some sort of crutch.  But this means only 1 call is made on the play rather than two calls on reversals. 

 

I think both of the changes would remove much of the frustration with NFL officiating.  It seems as though it has to be better than the current system of expecting refs to be "consistenly wrong" and "guessing" when they don't have the proper angle. 

 

I think challenging a penalty will be a disaster only because there’s less obvious subjective fouls like holding which occurs frequently if not on every play.  Are we now going to debate whether a hold was severe enough to constitute a penalty?  Ugh
 

I think what most sports fans want is consistency - especially with the judgement calls like Holding, PI, Roughing etc.  

 

The stuff with the catch is beyond laughable.  We’ve seen plays like Poyer’s INT called incomplete on replay then saw Smith’s catch rules complete in the NFCCG.  

 

IMO that’s the biggest issue.  Of course, there’s always going to be some degree of variance.  It is impossible to be 100% perfect.  But it has to be better than what we saw this weekend.
 

  I do think the NFL needs to hire f/t officials.  Only way to get better at this.

[Simon]

1 hour ago, Bob Jones said:

I know you're being half serious here, but you're not that far off with this one. And it seems that, in some games, I have actually seen where the "guy in the booth upstairs" used his power to correct/overrule the refs down on the field (without the ref on the field stopping the game and going over to look at the monitor under the hood). It didn’t happen too often, but I'm pretty sure I've seen this guy upstairs get involved, and it was even in non-playoff, regular season games.

 

My take would be to have a guy upstairs, like you describe, to definitely get involved in ALL close calls, and buzz the on field ref ASAP if need to be, to correct. Like you said, that guy should be part of the officiating crew, so there's never a need for the on field ref to go look at a tiny monitor. I surmise that currently, the guy upstairs is actually making the call, since he probably has a 65 inch monitor to see the play clearly, while the on field guy is looking at a what, 12 inch screen?

 

The only thing I was kidding about was the beer cooler.

The fact that the league chose to implement the stupidest, most inefficient, time wasting review process that they possibly could, primarily (imo) because they thought it would create some sort of artificial drama with a freaking referee decision, tells us all we really know about who is running things.

 

Hey you pencil-necked geeks who weaseled your way into making football decisions, the drama that people actually tuned in for takes place on the field during play, not with your drawn out reality show bullspit. Quit screwing up the actual game (you know, the entire point of your multimillion dollar broadcast) with fake theatrical nonsense.

[pocoboy]

Officials mics are always broadcast live, and New York review process as well. Transparency.

[Kiva]

Take gambling out of the game.  No more season scripts, let the team play and fall as they may. 
 

Stop propping up a team and giving them calls because of sponsorship. 
 

Stop the special treatment and get back to the nfl being a sport and not entertainment. 

[Bob Jones]

22 minutes ago, Kiva said:

Take gambling out of the game.  No more season scripts, let the team play and fall as they may. 
 

Stop propping up a team and giving them calls because of sponsorship. 
 

Stop the special treatment and get back to the nfl being a sport and not entertainment. 

I wonder how closely, and how often, the NFL examines the personal finances of their officials....or if they even do at all.

 

Re your 3rd point: that's never going to happen because they need the $$$ of people who aren't really football fans. Just saw a blurb a little while ago that said more people tuned in to watch the halftime show than tuned in to watch the actual game action!

[Chaos]

4 hours ago, What a Tuel said:

The biggest problem isnt that they called the holding. They called it right. The problem is that they didn't call probably 20 other holdings of the same nature earlier in the game. They magnify big moments through inconsistency which makes fans unhappy.

The only way to avoid this is to allow missed calls to be challenged 

[beebe]

the solution to penalties is to accept that officiating is and always has been imperfect and some games are going to be far more difficult to call than others. i guarantee there's far more bias in the way fans interpret calls than there is intentional bias by the officials throwing the flags. anyone without a rooting interest in the Super Bowl wanted a great game above all else. throwing the flag on the Eagles DB took an epic finish away from us. we felt robbed! and yet, the involved player admitted it was correct. it probably was correct. and had there been no flag, rest assured chiefs fans would have cut up every replay angle - slow motion and otherwise - and blamed carl cheffers for screwing them yet again. (remember, cheffers went into this game as KC's Public Enemy #1. now he suddenly is on KC's side? come on.)

 

again, accept that officiating is really hard and that mistakes are inevitable. 

 

umpires call balls/strikes correct about 93.5% of the time. balls and strikes! they're planted perfectly behind home plate, completely stationary, and have a picture perfect view of the pitch. and yet they're wrong 14 times per game on average — or about 1.6 times per inning.

 

on balls and strikes!

 

there are about 150 plays in a typical NFL game (including special teams). in games that are widely described as poorly officiated, we're usually talking about a handful of calls, or about 3% of the overall plays. some of those mistakes can be cleaned up using instant replay — and are — and sometimes even instant replay is inconclusive and people will disagree on the proper call.

 

again, it's an imperfect game, with imperfect officials. if you want to reduce bad ref variance, play better. you get 60 minutes and 150 plays to make sure one bad call doesn't decide the outcome. 

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

Either no replay and live like we did in the old days or make any call challengeable as BB said way back when. Of course this latest fiasco wouldn't be overturned because it was a penalty.

 

The problem on Sunday, was one the NHL referees get, you don't start officiating the game differently-use common sense. Not sure how you legislate that, maybe better education of refs or get more guys who played the game.

[PrimeTime101]

Refs that are watching a game via Moniter has a right to hold any penalty call for 20 seconds to review. Every game should have a team of refs watching on a monitor somewhere and they have final say on any penalty called.

 

HC has the right to challenge a potential defensive interference call either way. One Challenge. They get that wrong they lose a time out. if no time outs left, they get a delay of game called against them if they lose. 

[Nitro]

Simplify the rules.  More and more they read like they were written by lawyers. Refs are human and makes mistakes.  Live with it.  

[BADOLBILZ]

 

They can chip the ball and GPS the entire field grid to determine everything from spots to whether a receiver had both feet down if they want to.

 

Ideally for fans they'd go back to not calling holding on OL like in 2020..........and not allowing much contact with receivers like in 2020-2021.

 

Unfortunately that creates an environment where QB and WR can put up numbers...........and well that drives up the cost of doing business for NFL owners..........and they'd prefer that there is a true hierarchy of QB's and WR's because then they can be slotted appropriately instead of all the 1's getting $50M and $30M aav's.

 

There is no advantage to the NFL to ever get officiating right..........the more subjective it is and the more enraged fans get..........the more emotionally invested fans get in their teams and the more the owners can manipulate what is being called to help keep labor costs under control.

 

Fans have two choices.........take it or like it.