Monday night the Seattle Seahawks beat the Green Bay Packers on a bizarre last minute ruling of a simultaneous catch in the end zone.
This led to a media feeding frenzy Tuesday as various pundits and reporters debated the merits of the "replacement referees" vs. the "real referees".
But I noticed something was missing from the debate, namely a discussion of what the dispute is about and why the referees were locked out.
Here's what I found as I sifted through story after story ...
Let's start by looking at some representative samples of how this story is told:
ABC: Packers Seething as NFL Replacement Refs Take Heat
ESPN: NFL: Seahawks victory stands
NY Times:Replacements Face New Scrutiny
Bloomberg Businessweek: NFL Debate Rages Whether 'Terrible' Call Can End Referee Lockout
Bleacher Report: NFL Replacement Refs Are Awful, but They're Not the Real Problem
Yahoo News: Seahawks win the strangest game in their history on the call that will define replacement refs
These stories are representative of how this debate is being handled by the mainstream media.
What the media does talk about:
- The poor performance of the replacement referees
- How the replacement refs may be "hurting the game"
- Analysis of the call itself
- The term "replacement referees"
- The damaged brand of the NFL
- How the NFL referees are demanding too much because they make over $100,000 a year
- How the players may go on strike if the regular referees don't return
You can easily find these same themes repeated and echoed in just about all of the mainstream media coverage.
What you don't see:
- Why the owners locked the referees out in the first place
- Much mention that this is a lockout, not a strike, and what this means
- The term "scabs" or any mention of how owners are using the "replacement referees" as a hammer to try to win everything they want
- How much money this dispute is over
- Details about why the referees want to keep their pensions
- How much profit the NFL is making
But don't believe me. Try to find these issues being discussed in the mainstream media.
I've searched through more than fifty articles. I've listened to sports radio (AM 1360 and AM 1530). I've watched ESPN. I've Googled. I've Reddited.
And the only articles I've found addressing this topic were from Dave Zirin, this excellent article in the Huffington Post, the Atlantic, and here on DailyKos.
These articles fill in some of the gaps.
1. What is this dispute about between the NFL owners and the referees?
It comes down to two main issues. One, the NFL estimates it can save about 3.3 million a year if it moves the referees from a pension system to a 401k system. And two, the NFL wants the right to be able to suspend referees for poor performance.
3.3 million may sound like a lot but when you compare it to the 9 billion in revenue the NFL took in in 2011 or the average value of an NFL team (1.1 billion), it looks like the owners are fighting over peanuts.
And how much does the NFL really care about the performance of the referees? This argument seems weak when you look at how much the NFL has risked by bringing in unqualified scabs.
2. Why are the owners locking out the referees?
It looks like this dispute is more about power than anything else.
The NFL is not struggling. In fact, it's turning record profits. So why make such a big deal over such a small amount of money?
If the NFL really cared that much about improving performance, why would they gamble on scab referees?
Why did the owners resort to a lockout?
When you dig a little deeper, it sure looks like the owners did this simply because they felt they could.
They thought they could squeeze a little extra profit and decrease the power of the referees' union.
They thought that few would notice the scab referees' performance and that if anyone did notice, the media would never fault them as owners for going after the benefits of their employees.
And it looks like they were partly right.
Now I'm not saying that the media should agree with the referees. But they're not even talking about the lockout. The most common media narratives are about the poor performance of the scabs or an in-depth analysis of the blown call.
You have to wonder, if the scabs hadn't performed poorly, would this even be a story?
Why doesn't the media discuss what the lockout is about?