March 18, 2026<\/a><\/p>\nIn case you\u2019ve forgotten \u2014 or scrubbed Lance Easley overstaying his 15 minutes of fame welcome from your memory bank as a Green Bay Packers fan \u2014 LaFleur\u2019s predecessor as the Packers head coach, Mike McCarthy, uttered that phrase in the aftermath of the infamous 2012 \u201cFail Mary\u201d game, which was called by replacement officials the last time the league and the NFL Referee Association couldn\u2019t reach a deal on a contract.<\/p>\n
The current deal between the NFL and NFLRA is set to expire on May 31, and the league sent a memo to teams on Wednesday to inform them that it will begin training replacement officials next month and plan on sending those replacement crews on team visits beginning on June 1 if no deal can be reached with the union.<\/p>\n
Talks between the NFL and NFLRA are set to continue later this week, the NFL Network reported. The league has asked teams to submit their organized team activity practice schedules and mandatory minicamp schedules to the NFL offices by April 22 so replacement officials can be assigned to those practices starting June 1, the day after the labor deal is set to expire.<\/p>\n
The NFL wasn\u2019t as proactive back in 2012, and the Seattle Seahawks\u2019 14-12 victory over the Packers on that fateful night was the coup de gr\u00e2ce after three tumultuous weeks without the regular officials.<\/p>\n
In that game, the Packers were leading the Seahawks, 12-7, with 46 seconds left and the ball on the Green Bay 46-yard line. After a 22-yard completion Russell Wilson-to-Sidney Rice, Wilson threw three consecutive incompletions, leaving the Seahawks facing fourth-and-10 from the Packers\u2019 24-yard line with 8 seconds showing on the clock.<\/p>\n
Wilson dropped back, scrambled to buy time, then heaved a prayer toward the end zone. The Packers had eight defensive backs on the field, and as Wilson\u2019s rainbow came down, five Packers (M.D. Jennings, Charles Woodson, Tramon Williams, Jarrett Bush and Sam Shields) and two Seahawks (wide receivers Golden Tate and Charly Martin) went up, and Jennings appeared to catch it.<\/p>\n
Tate, after shoving Shields to the ground from behind, brought his right arm up from beneath Jennings and got his hand on the ball. Back judge Derrick Rhonde-Dunn waved his hands above his head \u2014 a signal that didn\u2019t make sense since the play should have been a touchdown (if Tate caught it), a touchback (if Jennings caught it) or an incompletion \u2014 before Easley, the side judge, came in from the side and signaled touchdown.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve never seen anything like that in all my years of football,\u201d McCarthy said after the game.<\/p>\n
Packers 14-year veteran center Jeff Saturday said in the visitors\u2019 locker room afterward that he hoped the debacle would lead to the NFLRA and NFL reaching an agreement because of the debacle.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope so. I don\u2019t know why it hasn\u2019t already changed, to be honest with you. I don\u2019t know why we don\u2019t have the guys who know what they\u2019re doing back,\u201d Saturday, a prominent member of the NFL Players Association at the time, said that night. \u201cIt\u2019s no disrespect to the guys we have. The game\u2019s just too fast. They can\u2019t keep up. It\u2019s just a sad, sad [thing]. We need the guys who do it every day and get trained year-in and year-out.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom a player\u2019s perspective, this is [expletive]. You only get 16 guaranteed opportunities, you know? And to have one end like this is frustrating.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sure enough, a few days later, the NFL and the NFLRA reached an agreement.<\/p>\n
Now, the hope is that it won\u2019t come to a similar situation this time around. But the NFL is clearly stacking sandbags in hopes that this batch of replacement officials will be better if an accord cannot be reached before the start of the season on Sept. 9.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe negotiations haven\u2019t progressed the way we hoped, from a timing standpoint,\u201d NFL commissioner Roger Goodell admitted at the annual NFL Meetings in Phoenix last week. \u201cWe obviously have obligations to our fans, to everybody in the National Football League, to play, and we will be prepared to play.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, we are taking appropriate steps to be ready, but we\u2019re also keenly focused on negotiations. So we\u2019d like to get a negotiated deal, and we certainly are focused on that.\u201d<\/p>\n
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