I was just curious why officials like Ted Hillary, Steve Welmer, Gary Maxwell, etc... work every single night, and travel long ways sometimes. I do give these men a lot of credit as most of these guys are great every single night.

Hard to answer for them, but I'm sure they love what they do and I'm sure have a lot of fun doing it.

This is simple.

They have job that allows them to leave
They are give 80+++ games a year
They are paid $1000++++ to do any game that they travel to
They get a rush/enjoy the games and/or this is their job

Tome forgot to add:

** ALL the coaches & AD's want them on their games. **

Nevermind that they are getting old and NEW guys need to be worked in!...but these guys can't last forever. I wish assignors would be more willing to work younger guys in with these fabulous vets. How will they pass on their trade? Stories will certainly help...but getting to actually experience some of these games with the vets can only help the game in the long run.

I could have watched Welmer up close last weekend but some "intelligent" schedulers put the Iowa-Iowa State game on a Friday night this year. At least the right team won and I got to see the highlights afterwards.

I attended a camp one year when Hillary was the guest speaker for a lunch break. He mentioned that officiating is his job now, and that is why he is working so many games a year, because of the decision to just referee.

You'll notice that, even in smaller conferences, you'll often get a crew of the "big-name" guys for televised games. The league offices want to make sure that these games are run well.