Referees

Dwight Howard's comedy tour continues. This time it didn't involve voice imitations or recycled iPhone jokes -- the joshing involved the NBA's new rule penalizing players with fines of up to $30,000 and possible suspensions for excessive flopping. Howard hardly sounded interested in adding fine money to the NBA Cares charity fund, but he changed his tune when he realized the new rule gave him an opportunity to rectify a charging call Lakers Coach Mike Brown called on him as he went up against Steve Nash during Wednesday's practice.

The NBA announced new anti-flopping rules for the 2012-13 season Wednesday which will fine repeat offenders. "Flops have no place in our game -- they either fool referees into calling undeserved fouls or fool fans into thinking the referees missed a foul call," said Stu Jackson, executive vice president of basketball operations. "Accordingly, both the board of governors and the competition committee felt strongly that any player who the league determines, following video review, to have committed a flop should -- after a warning -- be given an automatic penalty.

Call it the Vlade Divac Rule. Or the Derek Fisher Fine. The NBA announced it would fine players who flop too often, levying penalties of up to $30,000 and possible suspensions. "Flops have no place in our game - they either fool referees into calling undeserved fouls or fool fans into thinking the referees missed a foul call," NBA executive Stu Jackson said in a statement Tuesday. Already an old bunch, the Lakers don't try to take many charges on the court. They claim to hate floppers.

It turns out that the professional referees in the NFL - the ones we used to love to hate but, after watching their replacements, now hate to love - are highly skilled officials, with years of experience and training. They couldn't be swapped for refs from high school conferences and the Lingerie League, not without messing up the game. Professionalism matters, and workers have specific skills that make them good at their jobs. It was the performance of the "amateur" refs that ultimately pushed the NFL owners (otherwise known as the billionaire's club)

Week 4 of the NFL season is here, and the games continue to get more interesting. In Friday's Google+ hangout with Mark Thompson, formerly the Mark part of KLOS' dynamic morning duo, and Times NFL columnist Sam Farmer, topics include the return of regular officials and a review of Thursday night's  Browns-Ravens game as well as a look at top matchups and story lines for the weekend. Farmer admitted he'd "never seen anything like it" when the fans in Baltimore cheered for the return of the regular officials.

The front page of the Sports section Thursday shows a picture of Roger Goodell with his arm up and his thumb raised, supposedly giving the fans a thumbs-up. Based on his actions, I think that he has the wrong finger raised. Tom Miller Whittier :: I think Mr. Goodell finally realized that it was not in the league's best interests to have the words "National Football League" mentioned in the same sentence with the words "Vegas betting lines. " To make the commissioner feel the same way NFL fans felt these past three weeks, have some guy who has watched five episodes of "Judge Judy" or "Perry Mason" represent the league in the next collective bargaining negotiations.

It's game over for NFL replacements. The regular officials are coming back. The NFL and NFL Referees Assn. reached an agreement on an eight-year deal late Wednesday that immediately puts the regulars back on the field, beginning with the game Thursday night between Cleveland and Baltimore. "Our officials will be back on the field starting tomorrow night," NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement released after midnight on the East Coast. "We appreciate the commitment of the NFLRA in working through the issues to reach this important agreement.

The one thing about the National Football League on which almost everyone agrees is that it takes its job of providing first-rate entertainment very seriously. That could be one explanation for the league's effort to supplement the pleasure of watching two teams of superbly trained athletes compete by adding the comedy stylings of pick-up referees, capped by the spectacular fiasco of Monday night's Seattle Seahawks-Green Bay Packers game. Or the explanation may be simply that a business collecting more than $9 billion in revenue this year sees value in sacrificing one crucial component of its success - credible and firm enforcement of the rules - merely to save about $5 million a year, or five hundredths of a percent.

Note to NFL: You know you are in trouble when even the Lingerie Football League is making fun of you. Mitch Mortaza, commissioner of the LFL (which is exactly what it sounds like: Women in lingerie playing football), took a shot at the NFL on Tuesday when he said one of the NFL's replacement referees had been fired by the Lingerie League a year ago because of incompetence. Mortaza was speaking specifically of Craig Ochoa, a replacement official hired by the NFL. Ochoa was an official during an NFL preseason game and is on call as an alternate during the regular season.