THE NFL / BILL PLASCHKE : It Hasn’t Been Good Year for Men in Striped Shirts

In the zebra business, Jack Fette is the equivalent of a nice warm stall.

As an NFL line judge for 23 years, Fette survived playoffs, Super Bowls and even the Raiders.

Now retired, he helps younger officials survive. Sitting in his office in Lees Summit, Mo., he spends hours each day on the phone with referees, line judges and back judges.

He counsels them on controversial calls, warns them about tricky rules, holds their hands as they head toward another turbulent weekend.

One might say the current state of officiating in the NFL can be directly related to the activity on Fette’s phone.

He said he needs to install another line.

Although Fette says things don’t look that different, everyone else agrees it has become a war out there.

Blown calls followed by blown tempers followed by some dumb lineman blowing his paycheck on a fine.

Not since the end of instant replay, it seems, have the seven officials at each game been so criticized, so frustrated . . . and so dead wrong:

--In one corner of the country last weekend, San Diego Charger Coach Bobby Ross was twisting his head and screaming at the referee after a touchdown catch by Tony Martin became an incompleted pass because the crew missed his right foot brushing the ground.

Even Sparky Anderson has never argued like that.

--In the middle of the country, defensive lineman Donald Evans of the New York Jets was getting thrown out of a game after screaming at referee Bernie Kukar. None other than the esteemed Ronnie Lott claimed that Evans was “pushed” by Kukar, exacerbating the incident.

Why was Evans so mad? No reason, really. The Jets were penalized 12 times and the Indianapolis Colts not once for the first time since 1976. And an obviously poor spot after a fourth-down run cost the Jets a chance at a last-minute comeback.

--In a far corner of the country, the New York Giants were stunned by one of the worst calls of this or any season.

In overtime against the Detroit Lions, the Lions’ Herman Moore caught a pass at the Giants’ 33. After getting hit by Jarvis Williams, Moore clearly touched the ground with his knee, which should have ended the play.

But no official blew his whistle and Moore wasn’t tackled until he reached the seven-yard line. Jason Hanson then kicked a game-winning, 24-yard field goal.

Owners discussed these plays and others this week while roaming the hallways of a Chicago airport hotel during NFL meetings.

Nobody wants to hire the officials full-time, nobody wants a return to instant replay in its previous form . . . but everybody agrees something must be done.

“I think the officiating can be better,” said Carl Peterson, general manager of the Kansas City Chiefs.

Which bring us to four letters that could solve everything.

U - S - F - L .

Peterson, a former executive in the USFL, says the officiating could be improved by stealing a trick from his old league.

Allow instant replay, but only twice a half for each team, by request of the coach, he says. If the call is proven to be wrong, it is overturned. If the call is upheld, the team loses a timeout or is assessed a five-yard penalty.

“These will continue to leave the game in the hands of the coaches, but make sure important calls are made accurately,” Peterson said.

Speaking from the other side of the debate, former official Fette agreed that the old USFL system could work.

“By giving the coaches only a couple of challenges, we wouldn’t kill so much time, and we wouldn’t put all the pressure on the replay official to decide what gets reviewed,” Fette said. “I think that could work for everybody.”

Don’t be surprised if support for this idea builds at next spring’s owners’ meetings.

League bosses who do not want a return to instant replay counter with the statistic that in the 113 games played this season, only 27 plays would have been reversed.

Does 27 plays sounds like a lot to anybody else?

THE WORST

In a season during which Jerry Seeman, director of officiating, has already phoned at least one team and profusely apologized for his officials, it was difficult picking only the five worst calls.

Forgive us for the dozen or so that we left out.

1. Allowing a 103-yard punt return by the Rams’ Robert Bailey against the New Orleans Saints with several dozen players roaming the field.

To think that the record books will be forever tainted with that play, which should have been a touchback because of offsetting penalties for all those men on the field.

2. Allowing the Lions’ Moore to run into field-goal range after he had fallen to the ground last Sunday. The loss that ensued might keep the Giants from the playoffs.

George Young, Giant general manager and co-chairman of the influential rules committee, is vehemently against instant replay.

“We’re trying to decrease the probability of human error, but you don’t cut down on human error by adding more humans,” Young said.

3. Allowing Herschel Walker to score on a 38-yard touchdown pass even though he had clearly stepped out of bounds before crossing the goal line for the Philadelphia Eagles in a game against the Dallas Cowboys on Oct. 16.

The Eagles lost anyway, but won’t they be thankful for those six points during playoff tiebreaker computations?

4. Charging Chris Calloway with a taunting violation late in the New York Giants’ early October game at New Orleans. The penalty cost the Giants a shot at a game-tying touchdown, and led to the first of five consecutive losses.

OK, so Calloway pranced around a bit. That sort of call should never be made that late in a close game. When a rule is ambiguous, as this one is, officials should opt for fairness first.

5. Allowing Deion Sanders and Andre Rison to engage in a fistfight without throwing a flag.

That $7,500 fine later assessed each player should have been split seven other ways.

THE SAJAK DIVISION

Don’t laugh, but at least one influential league observer is planning to propose a new way to realign the divisions next year, and every two years after that.

Place the names of each team in a giant bin, mix them up, then pull out the names and assign them to different divisions.

Do it on national television in March. Make a big show out of it. Sell plenty of advertising. Bring in busloads of fans. Garner reams of media attention.

The craziest thing about this idea is that it could work.

You say this messes with the integrity of the current format? What integrity?

The names of the divisions are already meaningless. When the Rams move, four of the five NFC West teams will be in the Central or Eastern time zones.

You say this messes with competitive balance? We say it increases competitive balance.

What better way to keep Seattle Seahawk fans and players interested than to assure them that in two years, they could be in a division with Indianapolis, New England, Cincinnati and the New York Jets?

You laugh. But you watch.

POWER STRUGGLE

Quietly, a dispute has broken out between the two most powerful forces in the league.

The combatants: Jerry Jones, owner of the Dallas Cowboys, and Don Shula, coach of the Miami Dolphins.

The issue: The reputation of Shula’s son, Dave, coach of the Cincinnati Bengals.

Last week, Cowboy Coach Barry Switzer compared the Bengals to Iowa State. He was using the analogy to warn his team that an unlikely foe could defeat them.

Switzer certainly didn’t mean any offense to Dave Shula. There is more than a slight chance that Switzer didn’t even know who Dave Shula was.

Maybe he had one of his frequent flashbacks and actually thought the Bengals were Iowa State. More than once this year, he has referred to his team as “the Sooners.”

But Dave didn’t see it that way. He took it personally and after his team had nearly upset the Cowboys before losing, 23-20, confronted Switzer at midfield.

“You can stick that Iowa State,” David told him.

Switzer was initially upset by the remark, but later said that Dave’s behavior didn’t bother him because, “Some of my assistants told me that when David was coaching here, he was pretty immature.”

Guess who is mad now.

“Barry doesn’t know David and doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about,” Don Shula said of the incident.

This is the same Shula who controls the league’s rules committee and who often acts like a 31st owner.

But Jones, a man who pulls more strings in this league than almost anyone but the commissioner, is openly backing Switzer.

“From Barry’s perspective, I can understand where he was coming from,” Jones said. “What he was really saying was that Iowa State used to have a chance to beat Oklahoma.”

Jones also complimented Dave Shula during the interview, but the lines have been drawn.

The old money is on Shula. But the smart money is on Jones.

PARTING BLAST

Amid this season’s controversies over scoring and injuries and realignment, somebody man enough to tackle a real issue has finally been found.

Wade Phillips, coach of the Denver Broncos, has appealed to the NFL to make the San Diego Chargers get rid of their end-zone cannon, the one that has fired after every score for the last 33 years.

Phillips was scared out his socks by the cannon a couple of weeks ago--as if his Broncos had never before given up a score in San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium--and so he complained.

The league, of course, told Phillips to get lost. So now he’s planning retaliation.

“If they can do it, so can we,” he told reporters. “We can have bombs and hand grenades and fireworks going off in the end zone. We can have about 10 of them blowing up over their heads.”

Said Ron Dixon, president of San Diego Fireworks and owner and operator of the cannon: “I can’t for the life of me figure out what his problem is. I remember in the late ‘60s or early ‘70s, a coach named Bum Phillips came in here with little Wade running around on his daddy’s arm. This should come as no revelation to him.”

QUICK HITTERS

* THE THROWBACK BOWL, AN EPILOGUE: While many of this nation’s football fans were gathered around office water coolers Tuesday, recalling the wonders of that muddy Monday night game between the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears, a Packer employee was fretting.

According to Gordon (Red) Batty, the club’s equipment manager, all of the players’ shoes, all of the coach’s shoes, all of the footballs and many of the Throwback uniforms and pants were ruined in the Soldier Field muck.

Batty said the game cost the Packers about $15,000.

Best $15,000 they’ll ever spend, if you ask us.

* IS THAT LIKE A FEARSOME FOURSOME? When asked to describe the NFL’s fifth-ranked rushing defense, Reuben Davis of the San Diego Chargers said, “We’re a bunch of ballroom, brawling brothers.”

* HOW ABOUT THIS QUESTION: WHEN ARE YOU RETIRING FROM COACHING? When asked to evaluate his team’s performance after last week’s 35-15 loss to the San Diego Chargers, Seattle Seahawk Coach Tom Flores snapped, “What kind of question is that?”

* DOESN’T ANYBODY JUST BOO ANYMORE? While walking past the Tampa Stadium stands after his team’s 36-13 loss to the Minnesota Vikings last week, Buccaneer Coach Sam Wyche was hit with a flying binoculars case.

With the binoculars inside.

Another fan, apparently angry at both the coach and the weather, pelted Wyche with his rain slicker.

* SO THERE: For all you coaches who have complained that the new kickoff rule gives the receiving team an unfair advantage during overtime--Wade Phillips, are you listening?--check out this stat:

In only three of eight overtime games has the team touching the ball first scored on that possession. And those three possessions started on the offense’s 22, 23 and 29-yard lines.

* SAY IT AIN’T SO: As part of the city of San Francisco’s $26-million renovation of Candlestick Park for the 1999 Super Bowl, officials may sell the name “Candlestick” to a big corporation, which could then attach its own name to the stadium.

And you thought Midwesterners were mad when Indianapolis’ Hoosier Dome became the RCA Dome.

* HONESTY, IT’S SUCH A LOVELY WORD: There is a reason Houston Oiler officials try to shield owner Bud Adams from the media. That became clear in the lobby of a Chicago airport hotel last week during the NFL owners’ meetings.

Adams needed only a few sentences to pull the rug from under his team, which is struggling with a 1-7 record.

Adams on his coaching staff: “I will make changes if the players start to lose confidence and give up. I’m going to blame the staff for that, and I will think about doing something. You can’t sit around and let that continue.”

Adams on his offense: “I just don’t think the run-and-shoot offense works anymore. Teams are able to defense it now. They have figured out what to do against it. There’s no secret to what we are doing. We can’t do the same things we did in the past. We don’t have the personnel to run it.”

Quarterback Cody Carlson later told reporters: “I have a problem with the way it was handled. To put the blame on one or two individuals is not right and it’s not fair. (It) sounded to me like (Adams is) throwing in the towel.”

Added assistant coach Kevin Gilbride: “He signs the checks, so he can say what he wants to say, but that doesn’t mean he’s right.”

Good night, Jack Pardee. Good night, Kevin. Good night, Cody.

In February, new coach Jeff Fisher will have his hands full.