One of the complaints about the replacements was the length of games, which averaged 3:16. Last night's game went 3:15.

Guess they were right!

LOL...

Watching the game, though, didn't the flow just FEEL more like football than the past 3 weeks have? Flag, inform the ref, walk it off, move on... instead of Flag, doubt yourself, inform the ref, huddle with umpire, announce foul poorly, mispronounce team name, walk it off too far from wrong spot, talk with shady side official in black jacket, rewalk, discuss with umpire again, reannounce foul slightly less poorly, reset, forget to start clock, and move on.

I didn't watch the game, but I would have loved to have seen a play similiar to the one in Seattle on the last play. Wow, did you see the package they got. Not bad for a part-time job.

If the refs don't ratify that, they need to be locked out. I wonder if they got retro pay to boot.

I would have liked to have a nickel for everytime Barkley said, "That's thurrebull", after the game.

I do have a question though. Years ago, the NFL made a team that scored a TD on the last play of game still attempt the extra point. I wonder if it had anything to do with the point spread or the over/under bets.

The end of the Green Bay/Seattle game would been even crazier if the Packers block the point after, and ran it back for the safety to tie the game.

But if I was the coach of the Seahawks, I would have gone for two, and took a knee. However the NFL didn't have the two point conversion rule back then, and the play was dead immediately after blocked kick.

Apparently, you don't. :) :)
Oh dear. Wanna rethink that? 3 mistakes in that short a sentence. Impressive. :)

By NFL rule, if the last play in regulation is a touchdown, the try must be attempted. If this occurred in OT, the try is not attempted. Also, under NFL rules, the try is over as soon as the defense gains possession of the ball and the defense can not score during a try.

Basically, Seattle had absolutely nothing to worry about during the try.

Agree...the flow to the game was infinitely better than the previous 3 weeks. And the mic work from the referee (Gene Steratore) was also infinitely better than just about everything during the past 3 weeks.

Talking about "shady side officials" it surprised me how many times the supposed league representative that was suppose to help with administrative issues gave flat out incorrect information to the replacement officials. I could count at least 3 times they caused/reenforced a rules misapplication.

Lot of folks like Hochuli or Anderson. Steratore is my personal favorite. He just seems to look like he's about 3 seconds away from really just saying "ah screw it"

And even in the codes (NCAA and Canadian) that do allow the defense to score during a conversion, a "safety" is only worth one. To get two requires what would be a touchdown on a normal play.

+1

The flow seemed infinitely better (IMO) even though the time apparently didn't reflect it.

A Canadian defensive safety. I'll have to look that one up! ;)

Also deep in the playoff tiebreakers is point differential. So an extra point COULD theoretically be the difference between making the playoffs or not. However, since the CURRENT system for tiebreakers has been used it has never been used. I can only think of 1 time when it was used and that was in 1979 when Chicago got the 2nd NFC Wild Card berth by better net points in all games. Baiscally that was the point diffferential in all games thar year and the Bears won it by 4 points. On that day they were a -33 to the Redskins going into play but beat the Cardinals by 36 and Washington lost to Dallas by 1 for the finals differential.

I know college basketball officials are independent contractors. But college football officials work for a specific conference, so how come they are not unionized?

They are still independent contractors. They are paid like independent contractors and they are assigned games like independent contractors. They can be replaced anytime and often are replaced.

Peace

Its difficult to unionize when you have multiple employers. NFL officials can be hired and fired based solely on the discretion of the NFL, just like the control college conferences have. The difference is the multitude of college conferences on all levels of college basketball -- NCAA D1, 2, 3, NAIA, and Juco. There are officials who work all of those classifications (some even for both genders). Essentially, collective bargaining wouldn't work for the Big 10 solely (for example), and conferences colluding to bargain collectively would bring up sticky legal issues.