The NFL Refs Are Back

We went through all of this for $3.2 million dollars?

Pretty much. It cost each NFL owner approximately $100k to get this deal done. The issue that refs and owners got hung up on wasn’t exactly a pay raise, but it was the fact that the referees wanted a pension plan. The referees are essentially part-time employees and the NFL owners weren’t having that.

The refs are getting a pay raise from an average salary of $149k in 2011 to $173k in 2013, and $205k in 2019. Pretty good for a part-time job, huh.