Hochulie is the ref in the NFL no doubt. And I like his "dissertation-like explanations," but that's just my style. Plus, he seems to do a very good job.

I suppose maybe he's the reason why the NFL, the most wealthy and profitable American professional sports league, is the only pro league without full-time refs? Guys like him wouldn't give up their day job so the NFL would lose a lot of experienced refs.

Any opinion on the whole "full-time" vs. "part-time" ref issue? I've heard the whole "how many refs does it take" discussion (we're up to seven at a time now), but this full/part time discussion is new to me.
 

The rest of the major league sports play from 3 to 7 games per weeks with crews of about 4 and the same number of teams. The other major league's seasons are also significantly longer, especially when the postseasons and preseasons are considered. These sports need full time refs.

I think for the NFL the full/part time discussion is easy. You have 32 teams which makes for at most 16 games per week. Seven refs per games makes for 112 guys on the payroll for one game a week. Now sure they must prep and such, but the season is 17 weeks, the post season is 4 weeks and the preseason is also 4 weeks. This is less than a half year. The majority of the games are on Sunday. No full time refs needed.
 

That makes sense to me, particularly the economics of the situation. And they do receive a lot of training even though they only work a few days a year.

Even so, my perception is that the quality of NFL officiating has gone down in recent years. I'm not sure if that perception is a function of the coverage pointing out officiating errors or something else. One thing in favor of my objectivity on this is that I'm never really rooting for anyone. I just watch hoping for a close game with good hits, plays, and whatnot. And I tend to discount rather than credit what the sportscasters say (and I don't watch any SportsCenter-esque shows) just the games.

Do you think the officiating has been any better or worse the last couple seasons or is it just me?
 

Without a doubt I think there has been a decline in the quality of the officiating. What is particularly disturbing is that the "best" rated crews work the postseason and the calls during this most resent postseason were some of the most questionable I have ever noticed. You could read an article on this at MSNBC for specific references but I recall enough of my own to believe that there is a problem.

However, I do not think that this would be fixed by having full-time officials.

While we do not know what happens behind closed doors in the NFL offices there really should be a better system to find questionable calls and none-calls and help these guys get better. Something like an Offical Oversite Committee.