{"id":843955,"date":"2026-03-31T00:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T00:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/843955\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T00:08:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T00:08:13","slug":"replacement-refs-looming-for-nfl-sparking-2012-fail-mary-flashbacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/843955\/","title":{"rendered":"Replacement refs looming for NFL, sparking 2012 &#8216;Fail Mary&#8217; flashbacks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>March 30, 2026, 4:54 p.m. PT<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">The NFL is planning to hire replacement referees this spring due to their ongoing labor dispute with the NFLRA according to reports. Tom Pelissero was on it first.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">The last time this happened in 2012, the beginning of the league\u2019s season was marred by controversial calls, which Seattle Seahawks fans should remember all too well.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">The infamous \u201cFail Mary\u201d game between the Green Bay Packers and Seattle, which was broadcast nationally on Monday Night Football, took over the headlines surrounding the league. That was Week 3 of that season, and after that nationally televised game and controversial call became the main story in the league, the NFL quickly moved to get their top of the line officials back.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">CBS Sports reported that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbssports.com\/nfl\/news\/nfl-replacement-referees-nflra-lockout-intensifies\/\" data-t-l=\":b|z|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the league is also looking to<\/a> have their centralized officiating command center \u201cweigh in\u201d on calls in real time, which one can only imagine the possible perception of.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">This will be a tough spot for the NFL. They and their referees are at a standstill, but both sides clearly feel it\u2019s worth taking to this point. Officiating is already scrutinized enough in the digital age, but it\u2019ll only be magnified with another \u201creplacement refs\u201d saga.<\/p>\n<p>Expert NFL picks: <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":body nav (nfl)|e|auto spike click:6|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_sp_a\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/picks\">Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">They\u2019ll reportedly be hiring 150-180 from different levels of college football.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">One can only imagine what this next season holds after this news, but the only sure thing is that the criticism will be flying in from all corners of the discourse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"March 30, 2026, 4:54 p.m. PT The NFL is planning to hire replacement referees this spring due to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":843956,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[95878,7,6,96186,96187,95882,95896,95888,95897,95883,95881],"class_list":{"0":"post-843955","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-accessfree","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-sstssportsnflseahawks","12":"tag-sstsnseahawks","13":"tag-tagamerican-football","14":"tag-tagnational-sports","15":"tag-tagnfl","16":"tag-tagoverall-negative","17":"tag-tagsports-news","18":"tag-typestory"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116320882227803194","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=843955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843955\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/843956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=843955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=843955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=843955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}