From the first day of the NFL’s lockout of its officials, the conventional wisdom was that it would take a game-deciding blown call to spur the owners to get a deal done.
And the conventional wisdom was right.
However fans in Green Bay and Seattle remember the Seahawks’ game-winning touchdown on Monday night, a touchdown that came only after Seattle’s Goldent Tate got away with an offensive pass interference penalty and only after Green Bay’s M.D. Jennings caught the ball first, everyone else will remember that so-called touchdown as the reason the NFL and the referees finally got a deal done.
If the report from ESPN’s Chris Mortensen that a deal is imminent for the regular refs to be back on the field Sunday is correct, then there’s no way to view this agreement as anything other than a direct result of the NFL spending all day Tuesday wiping egg off its face. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell may have seemed aloof during the referees lockout, but he’s not above listening to the paying customers, who were outraged by what they saw on Monday night.
Perhaps more importantly, the owners -- who are ultimately Goodell’s bosses -- aren’t above listening to the paying customers. And the owners listen to their employees, too, and there’s no question that NFL coaches and players were telling the owners that a deal simply has to get done.
So something good may have come from that bad call. Not that it’s much consolation to the Packers.