Replacement officials on the way

[US Egg]

7 hours ago, Orlando Buffalo said:

Do you need me to show how bad it can be just  with Shawn Hochuli? Truly he is astonishingly bad. Too many NFL officials are simply inconsistent in regards to so many calls that your defense of them is silly. I understand the other refs "could be worse" but that is unlikely 

The league wants the best. If one believes the league isn’t striving to have competent referees then why take the game seriously. That would be inane.

[Bill from NYC]

10 hours ago, finn said:

They're holding out for a bigger percentage of the take on rigged calls they're making. 

If the refs are making rigged calls, I am thinking that the decision to do so is NOT theirs.

[DJB]

On 3/30/2026 at 5:24 AM, Bill from NYC said:

The owners have a league in which some players make more than 50 million per season, yet they consistently quibble over what would seem to be pennies that they pay the refs.

Gee, I wonder why they want to keep the refs underpaid and more dependant? 🤔

I read something yesterday that said that the avg NFL ref earns 345K per year 

 

They are fine 

[Bill from NYC]

10 minutes ago, DJB said:

I read something yesterday that said that the avg NFL ref earns 345K per year 

 

They are fine 

I don't disagree. I am thinking that the less refs are paid, the easier they are to control. 

[Mikie2times]

On 3/30/2026 at 4:50 AM, May Day 10 said:

 

I think you are incorrect.

 

Those weeks with the replacement refs were extraordinarily bad.  There were bad calls, but also extended delays.  The cadence of games was being thrown off, and by the 2nd or 3rd week the fabric of the sport was being torn and games were deteriorating into fights and other unnecessary drama.  It made me really appreciate how good NFL referees really are, despite the constant criticism and being taken for granted.

Ya, I'm reading this thread like huh? Do people not remember the Wilson Hail Mary and just how big of a cluster fug it was last time? Regardless of how you feel about the current state of officiating this wouldn't make it better and likely could make it far worse. 

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

1 hour ago, DJB said:

I read something yesterday that said that the avg NFL ref earns 345K per year 

 

They are fine 

 

The numbers I have seen are far less than that. I've read in the 205K - 250K range and that is only for the head referee position. The other officials are around 150K - 200K. 

 

I'm fine with the NFL making officials fulltime if they want to. They will probably have to double their salaries if that is what they choose to do, maybe even triple. But I don't think making the officials fulltime will magically make them call games the way fans from both sides want the game to be called. Many seem to be calling for full time officials, if that helps in the perception of more competent officials than go for it. Even if that is not reality.

[Dr. Who]

2 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

The numbers I have seen are far less than that. I've read in the 205K - 250K range and that is only for the head referee position. The other officials are around 150K - 200K. 

 

I'm fine with the NFL making officials fulltime if they want to. They will probably have to double their salaries if that is what they choose to do, maybe even triple. But I don't think making the officials fulltime will magically make them call games the way fans from both sides want the game to be called. Many seem to be calling for full time officials, if that helps in the perception of more competent officials than go for it. Even if that is not reality.

Is the game simply inherently too complex to expect higher competency? It seems that there are a lot of plays where the same violations occur and only some of them are called. When the calls occur disproportionately for or against one team or the selective timing seems to tilt crucial games, there is going to be a suspicion of bias.

 

It also appears pretty capricious which plays the league decides to impose higher scrutiny upon and which it conveniently ignores. Then you can look at certain crews and the statistical analysis of which teams appear to thrive and which ones don't. Maybe the NFL likes those kinds of controversy because it stirs up passions and interest, I dunno. 

[finn]

5 hours ago, Bill from NYC said:

If the refs are making rigged calls, I am thinking that the decision to do so is NOT theirs.

I was being glib, but I do think some individuals in the league office are putting their thumbs on the scale at times. It's so easy to do, so easy to plausibly deny, and potentially generates such enormous profits that it would be diametrically opposed to human nature for it NOT to happen. The sad part is that most of the public is simply not aware of it. As Nick Caraway muses in The Great Gatsby, " "It never occurred to me that one man could start to play with the faith of fifty million people — with the single-mindedness of a burglar blowing a safe."

[Orlando Buffalo]

14 hours ago, US Egg said:

The league wants the best. If one believes the league isn’t striving to have competent referees then why take the game seriously. That would be inane.

The NFL is an entertainment business, not a sports business, and they like headlines, which poor officiating generates. The NFL is not pushing for poor officiating but they have not made any major changes with the technology needed because the officials are part of the story. You and I simply disagree on the NFL goal for officials because if they wanted better officiating they would need to overhaul the way it is handled and use much more technology 

[US Egg]

51 minutes ago, Orlando Buffalo said:

The NFL is not pushing for poor officiating but they have not made any major changes with the technology needed because the officials are part of the story.

The NFL steadily upgrades the use of technology, particularly with cameras. No sport wants officiating issues to be a part of the story.

[Pecker]

The replacement refs were no worse than the officials refs last time, in fact, I thought they were more fair, as their “bad calls” were more evenly distributed amongst the teams.  Favoritism to the Patriots dropped significantly with the replacements as an example.

 

people were/are just more comfortable criticizing the replacement refs.  It’s psychological.  
 

the “Fail Mary” was honestly not that bad of a call.  You could see the Seahawks WR with his arm around the ball both while in the air and while on the ground afterwards;  Giving it some gray area and open to some interpretation.

 

the Bishop INT that wasn’t against the chiefs in the playoffs, was more clearly an Interception than the fail Mary, and was also ruled a catch. 

The Cooks Catch on the other hand was plain as day- clear as can possibly be, and was ruled incorrectly.

 

so right there, that’s two worse calls than the fail Mary, made by the “real refs”.

 

bring on the replacements! It will only get more fair. 

[Orlando Buffalo]

1 hour ago, US Egg said:

The NFL steadily upgrades the use of technology, particularly with cameras. No sport wants officiating issues to be a part of the story.

You don't think that MLB is enjoying the headlines caused by ABS? 

[DrBob806]

On 3/30/2026 at 6:24 AM, Bill from NYC said:

The owners have a league in which some players make more than 50 million per season, yet they consistently quibble over what would seem to be pennies that they pay the refs.

Gee, I wonder why they want to keep the refs underpaid and more dependant? 🤔

Bingo.

 

Another bunch of wealthy union busters, we've seen this many times before out in the real world. 

[Bill from NYC]

2 hours ago, DrBob806 said:

Bingo.

 

Another bunch of wealthy union busters, we've seen this many times before out in the real world. 

There is another factor imo. The NFL owners are a group of billionaire men and women who spent their lives accumulating wealth. This by itself doesn't bother me. That said, the less money refs earn, the better the chances for them to be compromised, or at least so it would seem.

 

In the Chiefs/Jets game in 2023, the cameras showed Taylor Swift 17 times. In Super Bowl LVIII, she was on camera 12 times. This makes money for the league through the advertisers. Huge money, or so I think. Young women are a group that the NFL can make new money on by attracting them. 

 

I know that I can be a bit cynical, but it is very hard for me to believe that the presence of Taylor Swift did not have at least some impact on referee's calls.

 

Jmo.

[Buffalo716]

I know a big ten former MAC ref and he might get the call 

 

He said a lot of the division 1 refs especially the power 4 guys like college reffing tho

 

Mite have to get the guys who want to move up the ladder.. Sun belt officials or MAC or FCS guys

Edited March 31 by Buffalo716

[GASabresIUFan]

On 3/29/2026 at 9:41 PM, H2o said:

Agree. There are some good college refs out there. 

Not in the Big 10.

[Steptide]

At some point, officiating is gonna be 90% Ai and 10% human officials. Officials will be on the field to more, or less, confirm the calls. I think we're a ways away from that though 

[Mr. WEO]

On 3/30/2026 at 6:24 AM, Bill from NYC said:

The owners have a league in which some players make more than 50 million per season, yet they consistently quibble over what would seem to be pennies that they pay the refs.

Gee, I wonder why they want to keep the refs underpaid and more dependant? 🤔

 

23 hours ago, Bill from NYC said:

I don't disagree. I am thinking that the less refs are paid, the easier they are to control. 

 

Since NFL refs are among (on average) the most highly paid officials, they must be pretty hard to "control".  For the amount of games they staff, they are far and away the most highly paid.

 

All posters here clamoring for replacements will be blowing up the site with complaints about how horrible the (new) refs are, because of course they won't be better. 

 

 

[frostbitmic]

The current refs still don't know what a catch is ... A Bills receiver makes a catch downfield and is flat on his back when the ball is ripped from his arms, the play should be called dead when the receiver is on his back with a player on top of him ... In the very next game that day, the same play and it went to the receiver. Perhaps streamlining the rule book instead of adding more rules would be beneficial.

 

The most obvious Pass Interference EVER was in a Saints vs Rams playoff game when the Saints receiver was so obviously interfered with Ray Charles could've seen it, no call was made and the Saints lost. Those weren't replacement refs and it was a playoff game, kind of an important game and call, blown.

 

There are a number of current refs that don't even belong on the field of a peewee league game, the league needs to review and remove these refs ... (Cough Hochuli cough) ... The officiating is awful to begin with, not sure I'll notice a difference with replacement officials.
 

[The Frankish Reich]

Let AI replace them.

Seriously, the refs are overplaying their hand. We have the technology to make most officiating calls remotely. Seven officials on the field since 1978 plus review/booth officials. And there have been proposals to add an 8th on field. Is officiating better today than it was in 1977? Or for that matter in 1964 when we had 5 on the field? I'm not sure why we need such large officiating crews on the field if plays are being routinely reviewed remotely. The high wire overhead cam sees things better than any on field official ever could hope to.