Penalties Are Not Referees’ Fault

The point that NFL games have been efficiently officiated again this fall is compelling. And I’d say that on the whole it’s true.

At the same time, it is obvious that too many penalties have been called this season. Waves of falling flags mar the product.

The officials, however, aren’t primarily at fault. There are three other causes, and they can’t all be fixed:

* Football is difficult to play well without making mistakes. Put yourself in a player’s shoes and focus on a complex assignment, considering that in the next 15 seconds, while you’re busy on the assignment, a highly paid adversary will be there to knock youinto the third row of the bleachers.

* Many coaches don’t do as much as they could to field properly disciplined athletes who might be expected, at the very least, to restrain themselves from jumping offside.

* The NFL’s 32 teams are so evenly matched these days that many a player, seeking an edge with inappropriate moves, takes chances he might not be guilty of in less competitive times. The simplest example is the blocker who, in a struggle with a pass rusher, might, in violation of the rules, hold him away from his quarterback.

Refs Usually Right

The fiction that pro games are sometimes poorly officiated is still out there.

The loudest complaints come from those who have a strong partisan interests in the result. They’re rooting for one team or the other. Or they bet one side or the other.

What happens, typically, is that after a series of flying flags, a flag is thrown against them on what seems a close call.

After the screams, though, most complaints, on examination, prove faulty or flimsy.

One of the most controversial penalties is for pass interference.

In many pro games, the usual complaint has been that the defensive error, “didn’t look that bad.” But as every coach and official knows, there needn’t be much contact to ruin a closely timed pass play.

Completions are hard enough to get when the coverage is proper. When it’s the slightest bit off, a completion is often out of the question

What’s right or good about that?

NFL Works at It

One of the three hardest jobs in competitive sports, I’d say, is officiating NFL games.

The two that seem the most difficult are playing quarterback effectively on an NFL field and hitting a pitched ball.

Yet NFL officials maintain a high standard of excellence. And lately, game officials have had more influence at New York headquarters than formerly. Or as NFL Executive Vice President Joe Browne said the other day, “There has been more buy-in from the refs this year.”

The league office staff that on Mondays reviews the tapes of Sunday’s games, putting every play under a microscope, has been joined by “two or three of Sunday’s refs” each week, Browne said. The referees help grade the officials, contributing live advice to the taped action.

They’re Too Good

Some things can’t be changed. Football is complicated and it’s impossible to play the game error-free. And those who make mistakes on a football field usually are subject to instant penalty.

The symptoms -- fluttering flags -- have appeared all over the league this season along with increasing parity in nearly every division.

The exact problem, if it is a problem, is that there are too many good players on too many good teams.

Nationwide parity means that to compete on every snap, talented professionals must perform at the extreme limits of their talent. And as psychologist Bruce Ogilvie said, “You tend to make more errors when the threat is overwhelming and you’re fully extended over a period of time.”

They’re All Good

Thus, the league is crowded with 5-5 teams, along with some .600 and .400 teams -- suggesting to some fans that all pro clubs are mediocre. But how can you prove mediocrity by the standings?

If the 32 teams all finished 8-8 in the standings, it could mean they were the 32 greatest teams of all time. Absolutely the best.

Or the worst.

In other words, it’s a meaningless stat.

Of one thing, you can be sure: There are more great offensive players than ever out there this season -- from Michael Vick, Terrell Owens and Brett Favre to Priest Holmes, Donovan McNabb, LaDainian Tomlinson, Marvin Harrison, Eric Moulds, Corey Dillon, Emmitt Smith, Rich Gannon, Jerry Rice, rookie Jeremy Shockey, Peyton Manning, Deuce McAllister, Tom Brady, Jeff Garcia, Drew Bledsoe, Ricky Williams, Marshall Faulk and countless others

When offensive talent as obviously superior as that gets stopped often in a season of parity, it must mean that the defensive talent is also well qualified.

What we’re seeing, therefore, are good offensive teams matched against good defensive teams.

Play-Calling Hurts

The problem on some clubs with obvious talent is mediocre play-calling.

According to wire-service reports, some of New Orleans’ most prominent players agreed after a defeat last week that two things were the difference in a 24-17 game:

Falcon quarterback Vick beat their defense, they say, and the plays called by their own coaches beat their offense.

Asked if he had been held back by the conservative calls that came in from the bench, quarterback Aaron Brooks said, “Honestly, yes. We have some explosive offensive players” who weren’t allowed to explode.

Against a secondary manned by only three pass defenders, Brooks was asked to throw only 31 times, including the swarm of passes he delivered in the fourth quarter when the Saints, playing catch-up, scored on two of his throws to make the final score seem more respectably close than the game was.