American Football Officials Today News Update

In gridiron football, an official is a person who has responsibility in enforcing the rules and maintaining the order of the game.

During professional and most college football games, seven officials operate on the field. Since 2015, Division I college football conferences have used eight game officials, the Alliance of American Football (AAF) in its only season in 2019 and the 2020 version of the XFL have used eight game officials. College games outside the Division I level use six or seven officials. Arena football, high school football, and other levels of football have other officiating systems, which use less than the standard seven officials. High school football played under the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) rules typically use five officials for varsity and 3, 4, or 5 for non-varsity games.

Football officials are commonly, but incorrectly, referred to collectively as referees, but each position has specific duties and a specific name: Common positions include referee (which is the lead member of the officiating team), umpire, head linesman (or down judge), line judge, field judge (or back umpire), side judge, back judge and center judge. The CFL used an eighth official (with no official position name) only during the 2018 playoffs, but that official’s only responsibility was watching for head contact with the quarterback. Because the referee is responsible for the general supervision of the game, the position is sometimes referred to as head referee or crew chief

The men wearing black-and-white striped shirts on an American football field are the officials. They enforce the rules, keep players from hurting each other, call penalties, and monitor the clock. Without the officials, a football game would be even more chaotic than it appears to be!

Each official carries a whistle and a weighted, bright yellow flag, which he throws to signal that a penalty has been called on a play. In the event that an official throws his yellow flag during a play and then sees another penalty, he throws his hat.

The referee has a number of responsibilities:

Announces all penalties and confers with the offending team’s captain, explaining the penalty Monitors the quarterback during the game, watching for any illegal hits on the quarterback and checking the legality of blocks made near the quarterback

Requests that the head linesman and his assistants bring the yardage chains onto the field to determine whether the ball has reached the necessary line for a new first down, as needed, at the end of any down Notifies the head coach when any player is ejected for unnecessary roughness or unsportsmanlike conduct

Umpire

The umpire has these duties:

• Confirming the legality of the players’ equipment

• Watching all play along the line of scrimmage, the division line between the offensive and defensive players

• Making sure that the offensive team has no more than 11 players on the field prior to the snap of the ball

• Monitoring the legality of all contact between the offensive and defensive linemen. This official calls most of the holding penalties

• Assisting the referee on decisions involving possession of the ball in close proximity to the line of scrimmage

• Recording all timeouts, the winner of the coin toss, and all scores

• Making sure the offensive linemen don’t move downfield illegally on pass plays

• Drying a wet ball prior to the snap when it’s raining

Head linesman

The head linesman has a number of jobs:

• Straddles the line of scrimmage and watches for encroachment, offside, illegal men downfield, and all the other line-of-scrimmage violations

• Rules on all out-of-bounds plays to his side of the field

• Oversees the chain crew and grabs the chain when measuring for a first down

• Usually runs in after a play is whistled dead and places his foot to show where forward progress was made by the ball carrier at the end of the play

• Assists the line judge (who stands opposite the head linesman) with illegal motion calls and any illegal shifts or movement

• Checks for illegal use of hands during kicks or passes

Line judge

The line judge lines up on the opposite side of the field from the head linesman and serves as an overall helper while being responsible for illegal motion and illegal shifts. He has a number of chores:

• Assists the head linesman with offside and encroachment calls

• Helps the umpire with holding calls and watching for illegal use of hands on the end of the line

• Assists the referee with calls regarding false starts and forward laterals behind the line of scrimmage

• Makes sure that the quarterback hasn’t crossed the line of scrimmage prior to throwing a forward pass

• Supervises substitutions made by the team seated on his side of the field

• Remains on the line of scrimmage on punts to ensure that none of the ends move downfield prior to the ball being kicked