The whistle blowers

EVERY SUNDAY IS JUDGMENT DAY FOR THE MEN IN ZEBRA STRIPES — - —

t has to be the best part-time job in the

world. Also the worst. Consider The Play.

With a minute and nine seconds left in Super Bowl XLII. as Giants quarterback Eli Manning executes his half of perhaps the greatest clutch play in Super Bowl history, referee Mike Carey is close enough to the action to literally reach out and touch it.

That's the good part.

The downside is that Carey doesn't really get to see it-not the way the rest of us do. What's more, he knows if he blows a call along the way, he'll get full-time blame, then see his ineptitude memorialized in slo-mo on highlight reels for the rest of his life.

Greatness isn't what Carey might have expected when The Play began. New England

Patriots linebacker Adalius Thomas seemed

to be right alongside Manning in the Giants' backfield at the snap: within seconds both defensive ends. Richard Seymour and Jarvis Green, had a piece of the quarterback. Green stretching Manning's number 10 jersey to its limit. Still, to Carey's eye. the quarterback was never "in the grasp." They need grasp and control, the ref reminded himself, keeping

his fingers off the whistle he has sometimes been accused of blowing too soon. They got the grasp part down. But Manning was still squirming, battling.

Now. as Carey circles in to Manning's left, a lunging defender does the Giants an unwitting favor-ping-ponging the quarterback out of harm's way. Manning stumbles, sets himself, takes a quick

read and rifles the ball downfield.

Later the postgame pundits can't miss the irony. A quarterback often bashed for folding under the slightest pressure mirac­ulously channels John Elway on the big­gest stage of all. A ref known for his quick whistle lets things play out a bit longer this time. Of such improbable coincidences are once-in-a-generation Super Bowls born.

But with the clock still ticking, sports-writers' story lines are the furthest thing from Carey's mind. He has a game to run. "So," he'll say afterward, "I see that it's a good play"-by which he means no fouls and no late hits—"but from my vantage point, look­ing past players, I can't really see that it's an outstanding play. I just know it's a catch."

Just a catch. Such is the life of the NFL ref.

On the 345 and some days each year he isn't shadowing NFL quarterbacks, Carey is co-owner of Seirus Innovation, a leading dis­tributor of sports and outdoor accessories. As a ref, he belongs to an elite fraternity that has included lawyers and longshoremen, dentists and podiatrists, cops and colonels. Several are former football players. Though they do

their weekend thing in front of mil­lions, only a few get a shot at some­thing akin to celebrity by uttering phrases like "Personal foul, number G4,15 yards, still first down." Many more gain notoriety when their work is picked apart in high-def superslo-mo from every angle.

"They," of course, are the 120 referees, umpires, head linesmen, line judges, back judges, side judges and field judges who keep NFL games running not so merrily along. The 17 seven-man crews (plus one floater umpire) experi­ence football in strange, jarring cycles-"50 seconds of boredom followed by five seconds of ter­ror," as an inside joke puts it. Their duties vary from the sublime (sig­naling "good" on a sudden-death field goal from midfield) to the excruciatingly mundane (making sure all game balls are inflated to a pressure of between 12.5 and 13.5 pounds a square inch).

The pressure isn't just in the footballs-it's on the zebras themselves. Again this year they seek to prove that the only part-time officials in any pro sport can cut the mustard in a realm where their efforts have historically elic­ited responses like "out of hand" and "an all-time low." This season has been a particularly brutal one. Take, for example, that flubbed call on the last play of the Chargers-Steelers game in week 11 that stripped Pittsburgh of six points. The Steelers still won, but without those six points they didn't cover the spread, so Vegas sports books walked off with about $32 million that bettors should've won. "It was chaos," one big-shot Vegas handicapper commented. "I've never seen anything like it."

You begin to understand what another NFL ref, Bill Leavy, means when he says, "I was a fireman. I was a hostage negotiator. Offici­ating in the NFL is the toughest thing I've done."

Head linesman Gary Slaughter and line judge Carl Johnson bookend the line of scrimmage as The Play takes shape. For Johnson, Super Bowl duty is gravy: His life's wish was already granted in 2001 when the league called to invite him in. Unfortunately, that was the season of

the lockout; the NFL dug in its heels and turned to scab officials. When it appeared the stalemate might never end, Johnson looked skyward and implored, "Lord. I don't know what the future brings, but if you're gonna take me, let me have one NFL snap." He eventually got that snap in Phoenix, with Atlanta in town. What he

remembered most was the athleticism of the Falcons' rookie quarterback, this Michael Vick kid. Bright future. Johnson thought, a guy who'll make headlines someday.

Earlier this afternoon Johnson was at the heart of one of the game's few disputed plays, an illegal-batting call against Giants rookie running back Ahmad Bradshaw. Manning had fumbled, and when the ball

squirted away, Johnson ruled that Brad-shaw had slapped it forward to a team­mate. The call nullified a key Giants first down. Johnson hopes to get through the remaining one minute, 15 seconds of the Super Bowl without further controversy. He knows a minute is enough time for anything in a close contest.

Johnson and Slaughter read their respective tackles at the snap: pass, lohnson polices the line of scrim­mage. Slaughter instinctively back­pedals five yards downfield to the first-down marker-Amani Toomer is by him in a blur-and scans a five-yard zone across the width of the field. If someone catches a pass at the precise first-down distance, Slaughter will be there to affirm it.

Glancing back at the line of scrimmage, Slaughterthinks Man­ning is toast. But Manning doesn't fall. In fact-unreal-he's cranking up to throw.

Johnson pivots, his revised mis­sion to spot pass interference or grabbing the face mask.

Slaughter reverses himself again, releasing downfield. where the receivers, having broken off their routes, seek open space. Slaughter is looking past safety Rodney Harrison as David Tyree comes to a dead stop in the middle of the field. Receiver and defender leap as one, Tyree soaring a hand higher than Harrison, who takes a desperate swat at the ball; it briefly slips out of Tyree's grasp. No way he hangs on. thinks Slaughter. Fourth and five. But Harrison's lower body slides under Tyree, who lands on the safety instead of the field. That breaks his fall. The ball stays in his hands.

Johnson runs to mark the spot, expecting a booth review. None comes. Slaughter, though, is cer­tain the guys in the booth are frantically eyeballing replays. "I promise you, it was reviewed," he says later. "The game just wasn't stopped for it."

The two-week lockout that had Carl )ohnson making bargains with Cod ended the week after 9/11 when the head of the NFL Referees Association, a success­ful and outspoken lawyer and NFL ref from Arizona, helped win offi-

cials an immediate 50 percent pay hike.

Fans know the guy as Ed Hochuli.

There exists a cult of Hochuli. There's actually a website-one of dozens set up in homage-called WhatWouldEd HochuliDo.com. Fifty-eight years young this past Christmas, the messiah of mid-field remains a commanding presence in voice, manner (continued on page 7O6J

WHISTLE

(continued from page 46) and certainly appearance. Donovan McNabb once said of Hochuli and his chis­eled physique, "He stands on the sideline looking like one of the linebackers."

You can therefore excuse skeptics who may wonder, Exactly how does a 58-year-old guy nurture so much muscle? Hochuli—who compares reffing to "a mainline of adrenaline going through your system"—has left some fans musing about what else may be going through his system. And early this season he showed that even messiahs have mortal moments: a horren­dous call in a complex late-game situation that led directly to a Broncos win over the Chargers and to hundreds of hate e-mails from Chargers fans.

The veteran of two Super Bowls is equally well-known for his expansive— some might say wordy—disquisitions sur­rounding a given flag. (He does not regard it as coincidence that the long-winded ref in a familiar Subway commercial wears his number, 85.) "As a trial lawyer, I make my living speaking extemporaneously, thinking on my feet, and that's what I'm doing on Sunday as well," he says as he kills time in McCarran Airport before one of his many corporate speaking gigs. "At the same time, when you get comfortable talking in front of hundreds of millions of people, it's not at all nerve-racking to speak in front of a few dozen."

Though Hochuli makes NFL officiat­ing sound like the most natural thing on earth, getting your zebra stripes is the cul­mination of a multidecade odyssey begin­ning on neighborhood fields that might have been purposely designed to break ankles. "You start at Pop Warner, and then it's how much of yourself you're willing to invest," says Hochuli. "It takes 15, 20 years of dedication."

NFL officiating is one of those don't-call-us-we'11-call-you affairs. Each year the few dozen prospects (out of some 3,000 applicants) who reach the recruit­ment stage earn the right to be subjected to a background investigation worthy of the Secret Service. "That's no exaggera­tion," says ref Bill Leavy, who was a Secret Service agent.

The league begins by scrutinizing a candidate's financial circumstances— investigations that have grow n more per­tinent in light of recent gambling scandals involving NBA official Tim Donaghy and Big 10 football ref Stephen Pamon. Posl-Donaghy, the league increased the frequency of the periodic checks it runs on officials, even after they're NFL mainstays, from every five years to every other year. Also, says Mike Pereira. NFL vice president of officiating since 2001, "we used to give out all the game assign­ments at the beginning of a season. Now we release them three weeks out." The logic is simple: The less notice anyone has of which crews will be working where, the lower the odds, if you will, of mischief.

The NFL won't discuss how many candi­dates are eliminated because of background

checks or precisely why they are let go. "Hiring is case by case,' is all l'ereira will say. Some red Hags are obvious enough. If Easter dinner has always meant lasagna with the (iottis, don't expect a phone call from the NFL During the season an official who merely sets foot in a casino or race­track risks immediate suspension. Bet on a team sport at any time and you're gone.

If the first check checks out. former FBI agents go knocking on doors to size up a candidate's romantic history, as well as his more casual personal relationships. As one official coyly observes, "There are presidents who probably wouldn't qualify as NFL referees." Recruits then huddle with a psychologist and undergo a battery of tests designed to gauge their emotional and intellectual makeup. "The league wants to make sure you're really crazy enough to do this," jokes Slaugh­ter, an engineer when he's not officiating Super Bowls.

Surviving candidates are dispatched to a lesser pro league for a few seasons. With the sudden demise of NFL Europe in 2007 the NFL now relies on its relationships with arena ball and the new All American Football League.

At which point, at long last, a candidate is poised for...the call. "It's an incredible feeling to tell a guy that alter his 20-some years of effort he's really getting in," says Pereira, who makes all such calls person­ally. "Guys break down." His welcome packet includes a starting salary of S47.840 for the 16-game season, which can escalate to a current high of 5132,800. Though modest by overall sports standards, those figures have come a long way since the aforementioned lockout, when a rookie zebra earned less than $23,000.

The league's seven-man crews take shape each year around April 1. (Cynics find irony in the timing.) Rule changes go out along with videos of each official's iffier calls from the prior year. In July come the clinics: three-day dawn-to-way-past-dusk alfairs at a Dallas facility. Officials must manage not to embarrass themselves in a half-mile run, a 40-yard dash and assorted agility drills. Then it's on to the NFL preseason camps.

For all that prep and practice, first games are always a shock to a rookie official's system. "Cleveland at Green Bay, 1990," says Hochuli. "I don't remember the first quarter at all. The first Hag I threw, the moment it hit the ground I realized. Wait a minute. This is Sunday, not Saturday. Thai's not a foul up here.'

Above all. zebras must adjust to the defining characteristic of NFL play: the sheer speed of the action. "In college," says Pereira. "you had one or two guys who were really quick. In the NFL all 22 guys are really quick."

Carey cites a moment from his NFL debut in Chicago. "I was a side judge then." he says, "so I'm downfield as the pass play develops. It's a deep out, and the quarterback overthrows the receiver by a long way. I think, There's no way that ball gets caught. And I'm getting ready to shut il down and go bark upheld for the next play. All ol a sudden not only does the receiver run under the ball, but

as he catches it he does a perfect double toe tap to stay inbounds. I'd given up. I almost blew it.

With Manning dead ahead and about to take the snap, umpire Tony Michalek sets up in the no-man's-land behind the New Kngland lincbacking corps. When first­hand lessons are to be learned about the speed and violence of NFL play, it's the umpire who usually learns them: A few-years ago Pamplona-like trampling inci­dents ended the careers of veterans Bob Boylston and Rex Stuart. Savvy teams will even use umpires to set picks for receiv­ers. Once, when Michalek experimented with slightly different positioning during a preseason game, an offensive coordina­tor got in his face, saying, "What the heck are you doing? That play was designed to run oil" of you.'

The significance of a Super Bowl assign­ment to Michalek is such that he recalls the exact time—10:48 a.m.—of Pereira's congratulatory call. He spent the ensuing hours thanking people who had encour­aged him along the way. Another natural at officiating, Michalek likes to say his 23 years as a trader on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange ("200 guys in a pit. sweating and shoving each other") toughened him up for the NFL. He was top-rated in 2006 as well but. with only five years of experience and no postseason experience, ineligible for the Super Bowl, which then required five seasons plus postseason action. As a consolation prize he got the Colts-Patriots AFC Championship game, which some were calling Super Bowl XI.I'/t>.

Now, with Super Bowl XI.11 nearing an end, Michalek homes in on the hands of center Shaun O'Hara; with his periph­eral vision he scans the offensive line for flinches. O'Hara snaps the ball, and the pocket collapses so fast you'd think it was a designed play. Michalek searches the scrum, making sure the offensive linemen don't break the rules as they desperately try to protect their harried passer. Whoever's getting beat is the guy who's gonna cheat. (Defenders know this and will sometimes lube themselves up to ward off* groping hands. That's why part of Michalek's pre-gamc routine consists of checking four ran­dom players for slippery substances.)

Richard Seymour muscles past O'Hara, and sure enough, the Giants' wily vet­eran has a huge arm looped across the defensive end's chest—but the arm's just lying there, in Michalek's judgment, not impeding Seymour. Technically it's hold­ing, maybe, but something only a novice would call—and then hear about from Pereira. No Hag.

Then just like that a leather-clad cruise missile sizzles over Michalek's head. His instincts swivel him downfield, where he sees Tyree and Harrison crumpling to the turf, the ball inches from the grass. Often on such plays Michalek will exchange glances with the deep guys and they'll have that "look"—the look of indecision. Not this time.

Michalek breathes a sigh of relief as he runs to set the ball in case the Giants go

with a hurry-up. The goal of officiating, he likes to say, "is that when the game's over, no one's talking about the officiating."

Jerry Markbreit is among a select group of people responsible for minimizing the time fans spend talking aboul the officiat­ing. Today the lormer ref trains his succes­sors. F.ach position has a trainer, a man with decades of experience in the trenches.

"When you're out there," Markbreit says, "it's like a war. Seven officials control the battle. I fell invincible on the field. I'm five-foot-nine, 195 pounds. I felt six-foot-nine and 290." Markbreit spent 23 seasons on that battlefield—457 games, he'll tell you—enforcing the league's version of the Geneva Conventions. He remains the only ref with four Super Bowls under his black uniform belt.

Markbreit's bottom line? Focus. "At the snap," he says, "everybody has one major responsibility. When Mike Carey's working, if you watch his head, no matter what's hap­pening. Mike is watching the quarterback. If you lose your focus on even one play, something bad can happen."

Ahh yes, something bad.... Through the years, NFL zebras have indisputably taken more flak per total number of calls than officials in any other major sport. Thus the famed Subway ad. For the record, it goes as follows: "I totally blew that call. In fact, it wasn't even close. But don't worry. I'll penal­ize the other team—for no good reason—in the second half. To even things up."

"I find it humorous," says Hochuli. "It's actually one of the clips I use in my presentations."

Pereira is not amused. "It upsets me," he says crisply. "And it's not just the Subway thing. There's the one with the ref who

can't get the sugar in the cup and another who doesn't have the coin for the coin Hip in the Southwest Airlines commercial." He insists people who buy into buffoon-ish depictions have no concept of the time and effort that go into analyzing and certi­fying an official's performance each week. Pereira and his eight-man staff exam­ine every play of every game from three angles: the TV shot, the coaches' sideline perspectives and the end zone. "Judged on the accuracy of the roughly 35,000 plays during the season," says Pereira. "I can tell you we're accurate 97 percent of the time." (Asked to name the play that most naturally lends itself to controversy, Carey replies, "Pass interference. Is it a catchable ball? Who got there first? Was the contact relevant to the play? Et cetera.")

Three verdicts are possible on any given play: correct call, incorrect call or incor­rect no-call—e.g., a hold that should have been called but wasn't. All mistakes are known as downgrades. "I'd imagine the average is four downgrades a game,' says Hochuli, who has been known to award a plunger to the crew member who makes the shiftiest call. "In a bad game there may be six, seven."

And worse than that? Hochuli says bluntly, "You're not there anymore."

At the end of a season about one in 10 offi­cials aren't there anymore. Not all of them take it lying down. Ben Dreith, released in 1990 at the age of 65, sued for age discrimi­nation and settled out of court for $160,000 in back pay plus attorney's fees.

Top-rated officials, however, qualify for postseason play, with its added rewards of S5.500 (for each man) for each playoff game and $ 1 1.000 for the Super Bowl. At season's end the top eight crews officiate the first two rounds of the playoffs, and

the highest-rated official at each individ­ual position gets the Super Bowl.

Two who have been so designated, field judge Boris Cheek and side judge Larry Rose, will converge on The Play from their respective Hanks. 20 yards deep.

Throughout this Super Bowl. Cheek has seen the Giants come at the Patriots again and again. Even after New England scored with just two minutes, 42 seconds left. Cheek overheard Michael Strahan on the sideline, rallying the troops, saying, "Keep playin', man! We're gonna come back and win this!" Cheek already knew the Giants' defensive end was a hell of a motivator. Now he wonders. Will Strahan turn out to be a prophet, too?

Meanwhile, I 1-year veteran Larry Rose, undoubtedly one of the league's more regimented officials, cycles through his presnap rituals: Make sure the sideline is unobstructed. Count the defensive players. He also thinks situations: Third and five, so it's probably a pass. During the action. Rose will talk to himself—aloud. When a run­ning back's knee hits the ground, he'll say, "Down. Down." That registers the result in his mind. So if the ball pops out, he knows it can't be a fumble.

With The Play developing between them. Rose and Cheek search for their keys. So intent is Rose on wideout Plaxico Burress that he's the only crew member unaware of the world of hurt Manning is in. Mean­while, Cheek picks up Toomer, who just blew by Slaughter; in the process he spots Harrison closing on Tyree.

Suddenly Cheek sees Tyree jump. Man, he went up for thai ball! Though Harrison is all over him, the play looks clean. Rose sees it too: The ball appears to be pasted cartoonishly to Tyree's helmet. Rose thinks. If he hits the turf, I'm gonna say, "Incom­plete! Incomplete!"

That evening, when Rose watches the replay at a postgame banquet, the thought that sticks in his mind is, IICarey had whistled Manning as being in the grasp, arguably the greatest play in Super Bowl history never would have happened.

Nine years ago this season, the NFL revived instant replay (supplemented by the present system of coaches' challenges). Replays first tour of duty, 1986 to 1991, failed largely because decisions were made by booth officials who reviewed plays at will. They would rewind and frceze-frame tapes interminably as fans, players and disenfranchised game officials fidgeted. In the final year of that system an astonishing 570 plays came under review—adding, by Markbreit's estimate, seven to 10 minutes to each game. Even so, the replays produced rulings that couldn't withstand subsequent NFL scrutiny. "The year it got voted out. M) plays were reversed." says veteran head linesman Mark Bah/, a Hallmark rep when away from the field. "Ten of those reversed calls were incorrect."

Then came 1998 and the infamous Phil Luckett. Though by any yardstick 1998 was a lousy year for officiating, the nadir was

a cluster of late-season calls involving the Lucked crew. In particular the crew mistak­enly awarded a crucial touchdown to Jets quarterback Vinny Testaverde in a Decem­ber (> ]eis-Seahawks game with playoll impli­cations. Facing a fourth and goal Irom the five, with 27 seconds left to go, Testaverde tried a quarterback sneak. Though his hel­met inched over the goal line, TV replays from every angle showed the ball itself resting a good foot short. Still, head lines­man harnie Frantz ruled a touchdown, and despite the outcry from the Seattle sideline. Lucked let it stand. The phantom score all but eliminated the Seahawks Irom playoll contention and. many felt, cost Seattle coach Dennis Lrickson his job.

Ancient history, says Pereira. "Last year 84 plays were corrected. That's 84 head­aches 1 didn't have to have on Monday morning." Which doesn't stop "perhaps 28 of the 'Y2 clubs" from contacting him each week during the season, he admits. "Remember. 1 deal with lfi teams that lose every week. I never go undefeated."

IVreira takes some lumps for his tireless defense of his crews. Sports blogger Adam Rank proposed that "an NFL referee could kill an NFL coach with a trident and there would be Pereira to defend the move." Others bemoan his defense of the officiating during the 200") postseason, when it seemed the zebras conspired to "take the game from" the Steelers-—the quote is from Pitts­burgh's Joey Porter—in their playoff'against the Colts, then gift wrapped Super Bowl XL for the Steelers at Seattle's expense.

Some attribute all officiating woes to the fact that the league is the only pro sport with part-time officials. Retired line judge Ron Blum, a golf pro, has no illusions, say­ing. "You'll hear things like 'These guys lock up their hardware store on Saturday and go to work in the NFL on Sunday, so they don't give a shit.'"

Officiating at the NFL level is hardly part-time employment. "You prepare every day," says Carey. "Multiple hours a day. You're lucky to have a real' job that gives you that latitude." Markbreit adds that it's not just seasonal work, either. "During the off-season, many hours each week are spent studying, watching video and attending meetings. I've always said offii iating is a full-time job masquerading as a part-time job.'

Pereira sees no need lor full-time officials in a sport with a schedule that stretches to 20 games at most, including postseason play. Noting that in the decades it lakes to reach the NFL. candidates will have developed their own businesses and lifestyles, lie adds, "If I said we were going to go full-lime, I'd probably lose 'M) percent of my staff."

The /.ebras will tell you that regardless ol what beat writers may think, ref's pride themselves on having the respect of the most knowledgeable football insiders of all: the players. Sure, sometimes you'll get called out by a Joey Porter. And you're not likely to get sympathy when you're wounded in action, either. Former umpire Bob Wag­ner tells of the lime he slopped one of Dan Marino's lasers with his forehead. "I did a 360, wobbled around. One of I lie lineback­ers said. Bob. you all right"-' 1 said, 'Yeah, 1 think so.' Next thing I knew, Marino was

looking at me and saying, 'Well, if you're all right, then get the fuck out of the way next time—you ruined a good pass!'"

Still, says Carey, "for 99 percent of the players, it's 'No, sir. Yes, sir.'" Even when it comes to the trash talk between play­ers, says Hochuli, "you'd be surprised how much of that is joking."

TO. too? Yes, the refs agree. T.O. too.

Being realists, officials harbor little hope of ever winning over their ultimate critics— the fans. You wonder, though: Aren't there times when a high-profile ref encounters an unusually appreciative fan, say, back at the hotel bar? It bears noting, for example, that one of Carey's colleagues refers to him as "the ebony Elvis."

"Mike's a genuine rock star," says the official. "He's got that presence. Every­body wants to take pictures with him, to be around him." Carey laughs and waves off such characterizations. But Hochuli con­cedes. "I'd have to say yes, there are group­ies. I'm just not sure any of my groupies would be found in im.-vhhjy."

Sum I Iclverson is this Super Bowl crew's "free safety." As back judge, he covers deep middle, a g(X)d 40 yards from the line of scrimmage. That's where The Play will find him.

This whole drive, the juices have been

flowing big-lime, because Helverson knows it's probably the Giants' last possession—do or die. In this dean game it was he who called lhe first foul, a long-ago pass interfer­ence against the (iiants. He'd prefer not to have to call its last one on some Hail Mary.

Even from half a Held away Helverson can see Manning is in trouble. And then, from out of the melee: Incoming! Instinc­tively Helverson shifts his focus to the receivers. If he's going to spot an infrac­tion, he won't do it by admiring the pass.

Tyree makes his leaping grab directly in front of the back judge, who rushes to the pile; his top priority is to peel Harrison off the receiver in case the Giants go with a hurry-up. The Play becomes Act I of a stunning run of game action that unfolds in Helverson's neighborhood, climaxed a few snaps later by Burrcss's backpcdaling touchdown catch. When he sees it again on TV in his hotel room at one a.m., it occurs to Helverson that he may never again offici­ate a more thrilling sequence of football.

Thai realization is hours away, however. What's on his mind as the Giants prepare to kick off again is this: From the start of The Play, it took Manning all of 36 seconds to get the Giants into the end zone. Let's see what Tom Brady can do with 35__

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