Sports Reporter
scschroc@mavs.coloradomesa.edu
The Green Bay Packers have already matched their loss total from all of last season and suffer from a struggling offensive line. The Rams’ offense is unbelievably horrible. Darrelle Revis, arguably the NFL’s best defensive back, is out for the season.
Wait, does this mean we are finally done talking about the “Replacement Refs” and how they cost my Packers a ga — I mean, how unfortunate it was for inexperienced refs to be put under the scrutiny of millions of people?
Whether you’re sympathetic towards the situation or just pissed off, it no longer matters. The focus is back on football. Well, almost.
“It was pretty much ‘Come on it and vote,’” said Scott Green, president of the Referees’ Association. “We’re going to talk football now. We’re going to stop talking about CBAs and lockouts and now we’re going to talk about rules and video and getting ourselves ready to work football games.”
The refs don’t want publicity. If they are in the spotlight and the focus of all the talking heads on TV, they did something wrong.
“The last Super Bowl that I worked, when we got in the locker room, I said, `You know, the best thing about this game, nobody will remember who refereed this game,’” Green said. “That’s how we like to work.”
This may defeat the whole idea of moving on to actual football, but I just have to touch base on the Packer-Seahawk game that almost made me put a hole in the University Center TV. I promise we can move on permanently after this.
First, the game shouldn’t have been that close because, well you know, Green Bay is always the best. But credit the Seahawks’ defense.
More importantly, however, the referees did something that should never happen: directly impact the outcome of the game. The NFL even admitted that the officials screwed up several calls leading up to the “touch-ception” call.
Some of the refs aren’t even good enough for the Lingerie Football League. The NFL borrowed officials from the league that features women playing in underwear, which is ridiculous to start with. And now the LFL said they fired those borrowed refs for “on-field incompetent officiating” during the NFL games.
Two good things have come from the sub-par officiating. The first, obviously being the new eight-year contract agreed to by the real officials and, the more amusing fallout of the two, being the jokes that have surfaced. An online meme showed two referees saying, “After further review, the runner did not touch second base. Touchdown Celtics.”
My favorite, however, is the list of jobs the replacement refs could do now that their professional officiating days are over. For example, they could be baseball umpires. Because if they don’t know what to call, they can just throw their hands up and call it a tie. Even better, I read on Fox Sports that the refs can sell shoes at Footlocker. There is obviously less pressure involved, and they are already dressed for it.
As the “Replacement Ref” era is now over we can get back to football and not worry about how the officials can screw up the next game. Plus, we get to enjoy the jokes, puns and memes floating around.
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