N.F.L. Reaches Labor Deal With Referees!!
The National Football League reached agreement on an eight-year labor deal with its game officials late Wednesday night, effectively ending a lockout that forced unprepared replacement officials onto the field, creating three weeks of botched calls, acute criticism, furious coaches and players, and a blemish — however temporary — on the integrity of the country’s most popular sport.
The agreement, which was being put in writing late Wednesday night, came 48 hours after the nadir of the league’s experiment with replacement officials, when an incorrect call on the final play of the Monday night game cost the Green Bay Packers a victory against the Seattle Seahawks.
That nationally televised debacle spurred two days of intense and lengthy negotiations against the backdrop of immense public pressure and scorn, most of it directed at the league. Both sides were so determined to play no more games with replacements that they raced Wednesday night to get officials in place to work this week’s slate of games.
Commissioner Roger Goodell is temporarily lifting the lockout so a crew of regular officials can work the Ravens’ game against the Cleveland Browns in Baltimore on Thursday night. The members of the officials’ union will then gather in Dallas on Saturday and are expected to vote to ratify the contract, with regular officials expected to then work Sunday’s games.
Goodell said: “This agreement supports long-term reforms that will make officiating better. The teams, players and fans want and deserve both consistency and quality in officiating. We look forward to having the finest officials in sports back on the field.”
Scott Green, the head of the officials’ union, said, “We are glad to be getting back on the field for this week’s games.”
Under the terms of the deal, pensions will remain in place for current officials through the 2016 season. New officials will get a 401(k) instead. The average official’s salary will rise to $173,000 in 2013 from 149,000 in 2011.
Beginning in 2013, the N.F.L. will have the option of hiring a number of full-time officials; officials currently are part-timers.
The negotiations with officials were conducted largely by Goodell and the league’s top lawyer, Jeff Pash, with little of the direct owner involvement that was featured during negotiations with the players last year.
The latest round of talks began last Saturday. On Monday, before the Packers game, the sides agreed to meet again on Tuesday. Once the talks began that morning, they took on a new urgency with some owners, who were concerned about the damage being done to the league’s credibility by the replacements. The sides met for 17 hours on Tuesday and went well into the night on Wednesday.
The lockout began in June, and while a fight over the officials’ pensions was the most prominent hurdle — and the final one that the sides worked on late Wednesday — the league also sought more control over grooming and replacing officials, in the name of improving officiating long term.
But as officiating and the control of the games deteriorated with each week, Goodell came under withering fire, which reached a peak on Tuesday morning. The level of the uproar seemed to take some owners by surprise, but there was little question Wednesday night that it spurred them into action. The Colts owner Jim Irsay wrote on his Twitter feed that owners were “desperately trying” to get a deal done. “Let’s be clear, when our N.F.L. fans talk, we listen,” Irsay said. “If you’re unhappy, we’re unhappy ... we’re here to serve you. Everything we do is to please you!”
First, though, the league and officials had to please each other. Early on Wednesday, they reached a compromise on the hiring of additional officials to create the so-called bench that the league wants to use to replace officials they believe are underperforming.
The pension proved more complicated. Officials had hoped to retain a traditional pension while the league wanted to eliminate it in favor of a 401(k). The officials had offered a proposal to have current officials retain their pensions; new officials who are hired would be enrolled in a 401(k). That would allow the league to get rid of the pensions by attrition, as the existing officials retired.
When they return to action, the regular officials are likely to be rusty for at least a few games; they, like the players, use preseason games to round into form. But they will certainly have a better command of the rules than the replacements did.
Even before the regular season began, the referee Ed Hochuli became a headmaster of sorts in an officiating boot camp during the lockout, circulating five-hour tests on rules among the 121 officials, conducting weekly conference calls to discuss rules and sending around hours of tape every week so that officials would be prepared to step in.
For the frustrated fans, coaches and players, they cannot get back soon enough.
“It would be nice to have them back,” said Redskins Coach Mike Shanahan. Shanahan’s son Kyle, the team’s offensive coordinator, was fined $25,000 this week for profanely berating officials after last week’s game.
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