Since the start of the 2012 season the NFL and its referees, the NFLRA, have not been able to agree to a new contract and because of that the NFL has had to use very inexperienced replacements.

Due to advancing knowledge of the impact of concussions and over 3,000 impending lawsuits that could cost the league anywhere up to $10 billion. The NFL has increased their emphasis on changing rules to improve player safety.

It’s understandable that the league is in no place to be spending excess money at the moment but what good are more strict rules if the right people are not in place to enforce them?

Philadelphians got a first-hand view of one of the major problems that the NFL has had to deal with over the past year.

Week two of the NFL regular season featured a home game for the Philadelphia Eagles against the Baltimore Ravens. The referees working the game were unable to keep the game under control.

Aside from a few terribly blown calls, some overturned, some not, there were many after-the-whistle confrontations that carried on way beyond the norm and could have easily resulted in injury.

Most regular officiating crews in the league have one or two rookies on each crew if any at all. Very few of the replacements have any NFL experience and none of them have had regular or recent experience in the league at all.

None of the officials are current Division I officials and some past refereeing experiences of the replacements are six man football, high school, Division II, Division III and even the Lingerie Football League.

Every piece of the current negotiations between the league and the officials is unknown at this time but what are known as a sticking point are the money and the pension plan.

Plainly put, the league wants to increase the number of officials and decrease the pay with no pension plans. The officials want the same number of referee crews with increased pay and better pension plans.

The thought of the league administrators was these replacements would get better as the season went on. From Week one to Week two, the performance dipped. If this trend continues it will be hard for the league to not cave in to what the NFLRA wants.