Broncos’ drubbing highlights replacement refs’ ineptitude

After what was generally regarded as a good performance during Week 1 of the NFL season, many were wondering just how big of an impact the replacement officials would really have on the games being played, and in Week 2 we got the answer – too much.
While the Broncos and Falcons duked it out on Monday night, the clear story of the game was the mistakes being made time and time again by the officiating crew. After a weekend in which the officials were openly being questioned about their ability to handle the game, Monday Night’s game demonstrated just how much the NFL needs to get their regular officials back to work.
In a first quarter that lasted over an hour in real time, the Broncos and Falcons got involved in a bit of a scrum following a Knowshon Moreno fumble. During the ensuing aftermath, players from both teams left their bench to get involved, punches were thrown and one referee was grabbed and pulled away from the pile-up by Broncos center JD Walton. After more than six minutes of this, only one player, Falcons’ DE Ray Edwards, was penalized.
As for the fumble itself, it’s pretty clear during the replay that you can’t tell who has full control of the ball before the pile-up occurs, but one official signaled that Atlanta had recovered the ball, before even getting to the bottom of the pile, where Broncos tackle Orlando Franklin was clutching the ball.
There were two particularly poor pass interference penalties, one in which the receiver clearly falls down with no contact, and another in which the ball was tipped before reaching the receiver, making him legal to hit (although the Broncos used one of their challenges to get that called reversed).
Matt Ryan also drew a penalty on a play in which he slid, feet first, to try and get down before the Broncos defenders could hit him. The referees made the right call in that the Broncos defenders made contact with him after he began to slide, but they only threw the flag after Ryan (and about 70,000 fans in the Georgia Dome) began complaining to the referee.
“Now the players are taking advantage of the lack of experience and the lack of game-control by the replacement officials,” former NFL official Jim Daopoulos said during the second half of the game. “They’re just too inconsistent. The players are pushing them. And the inconsistency is natural, because this is not something you can learn as quickly as they have to learn it.”
At a time when the NFL is trying to improve player safety in light of facing hundreds of concussion lawsuits relating to the abuse they endured on the field, the league is simultaneously taking the hypocritical stance that the under-qualified and under-prepared officials can enforce the rules upon which the players rely for safety.
“The officials want to talk. They want to be back on the field. To a man, they want to come back,” said Daopoulos.

It’s time for the powers-that-be, like Gooddell, to find a way to get them to the negotiating table.
Allowing officials like the one who told Lesean McCoy that he “need(s him) for his fantasy team” is tarnishing the league’s early slate of games.

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