The SEC must sort out its officials

Awful.

Terrible.

Nope.

Why in the hell did they call that?

How could they not see that?

Those are the words usually describing a refereeing crew in ALL team sports – especially if the team’s losing. Except over and over again, we’re hearing these words about SEC officials?

Do they understand targeting? How was that clear?

How did they miss that call? 

Why did the official get in the way there? 

How did they managed to screw that one up?

Do they not know what a field goal is?

(We’re serious: That happened during Georgia vs Missouri game at Farot Field this year).

Here are some highlights of SEC stupidity.

Devin White getting booted out for targeting against Mississippi State. Some couldn’t see why it was a personal foul, some could. But everyone – including tens of thousands of LSU fans – thought White was jobbed for getting called for targetting and subsequently booted, which will make him miss one half of the small, inconsequential home game against the no-name No.1 team Alabama on Saturday.

A ref getting in the way of a blatant Ole Miss touchdown against LSU. The ball was coming straight to the wide receiver, and the referee somehow didn’t notice and seemed to get in the way of the wide receiver. It’s not really mentioned on the Ole Miss blogs or created a lot of controversy (mostly due to the fact that the Tigers eviscerated the Rebels).

The refs at the Georgia vs Missouri game, who seemed to miss a Georgia player fumbling the ball while going in for the touchdown. There wasn’t clear and conclusive evidence that it was a touchdown. But to the refs it wasn’t.

The stupidest event SO FAR wasn’t the refs – against during a Missouri game – where the refs ruled defensive pass interference on an uncatchable ball against Kentucky, when anyone – including Kentucky fans – could have seen it was the opposite way. The penalty – given in the last second game – resulted in an untimed down and Kentucky winning.

The refs not seeming to understand what a field goal was, when Missouri’s Justin Tucker made a 41-yarder when just inside the top right upright. That wasn’t stupid, it was imbecilic.

Then there are the missed targeting calls, the missed pass interference calls, which are too many mention. Or the missed ejections, like the one Raekwon Davis should have had for jumping on a player and beating the living crap out him. Davis was flagged, but there was no ejection – despite the serious violence of the player’s actions (Nick Saban kept him out for half a game though).

In short SEC refs are wafting like baseball players, lucky if they are batting .300 right now.

And if the SEC’s head offices in Birmingham, AL claim to watch over their refs as they claim to do, then they are engaging in the biggest cover-up since Watergate. It got out of jail with the ‘call went upstairs to see whether it was targeting, and it WAS targeting, so LSU can shut the hell up, y’all’, but managed to put itself further in jail.

The problem for the SEC is that no-one’s calling them on their crap. No-one saying that EVERY targeting expulsion should be reviewed by a three-man SEC refereeing committee (I mean, what are they doing all week apart from counting money made from free labour anyway?), and then decisions about banning a player for the next half game made from there. They aren’t taking action over seriously violent play. They aren’t re-looking at games and suspending players for eye-gouging (Florida vs Georgia), or out-and-out assault (Davis). And worse, no-one is suspending refs for getting in the way of would-be touchdowns, blocking players downfield, and blatantly missing field goals.

Listen, we’re not asking the SEC to suspend refs for missing holding calls. But if they blatantly screw up, they should be punished accordingly.

By not suspending referees for a game for their dumbass mistakes, the SEC is letting refs are simply get away with their stupidity over and over again. No-one is sitting them down and telling them to improve, or threatening to take away the big games and moving them from FBS to Division-III level. And worse, we desperately need younger officials who can keep up with the speed of play. We’re not being ageist, but it’s important to blood in new people. The NFL seems to be happy with blooding new refs. Why doesn’t the SEC? When one of your refs runs into a player in the end-zone, things have got to be looked at.

And bad refereeing has already cost a team one game this year, and it’ll get worse unless the SEC sorts out this problem.