NFL Playoff Thread

My apologies if this has already been posted but Charlie Pierce's great piece in Grantland on the Patriots/Broncos so-called football game and the anarchistic genius of Bill Belichick

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7468068/charles-p-pierce-new-england-patriots-denver-broncos-divisional-playoff-game

For years now, the undeniable fact about the National Football League has been that the whole operation is grimly determined to combine the unpredictability of an Amway seminar with the giddy good humor of the North Korean army. This problem has grown especially acute under the recent stewardship of Commissioner Roger Goodell, who seems to imagine himself on a balcony in Buenos Aires, tossing money to the peasants.

 

This.

I cringe whenever Triplette does a game. You just know something is going to get screwed up. Carey is very very good.

Personally, I would rather see Carey do the Super Bowl than Hochuli.

 

NFL refs used to be required to make a minimum salary outside of football. Many of the guys used to be accountant, lawyers, doctors and various other high paying jobs. The logic was, and probably still is, that someone as stable as that should not be tempted to throw games.

Not sure if the NFL still does this, but I think baseball and basketball made them full time employees and we saw where that the NBA and MLB.

 

Seriously though, does it effect their work ability or affect it. I'm leaning toward affect.

 

Couple of questions regarding officials:

1) Does the NFL do it like baseball and put together "all-star" teams of officials for the playoffs, or do the same crews that work together during the regular season work the playoffs together?

2) MileHigh speaks wisely when he talks of the officials' work load during the season. But, when talk turns to having "full-time" officials, my thought is, "OK, but what do they do during the offseason? Watch film all the time?" There's no more NFL Europe, so they're not going to see a lot of live action.

 

One more question: Does referee Bill Leavy receive a visit from the makeup artist on Dawn of the Dead before each game, or does he just naturally look like a corpse?

 

Adding to Belichick's genius is that he embarrassed Tim Tebow and, by proxy, people who are religious, and, by proxy, Republicans. Therefore, he's awesome!

 

Bill Belichick has a bumper sticker that reads "honk if you like Reagan."

 

Honk!

 

Tom Brady has a bumper sticker that reads "honk if you refuse to file for unemployment."

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Bell_(American_football_official) attorney
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Anderson_(American_football) - retired dentist
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Haggerty_(American_football_official) - teacher
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Morelli - principal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Markbreit - trader for 3M


Just a little work...