The NFL has distributed crew assignments to its referees for the upcoming 2026 season, a routine offseason step that this year comes wrapped in anything but routine circumstances.

With the NFL Referees Association's collective bargaining agreement set to expire on May 31, 2026, the league is essentially telling its officials where they'll be working while simultaneously preparing for the possibility that those same officials won't be working at all. It's the kind of institutional multitasking only a $20 billion organization could pull off with a straight face.

The crew assignments going out now are standard procedure. Every spring, the league parcels out its officiating crews for the upcoming season, giving referees their rosters and setting the table for the year ahead.

Seven new officials have been hired for 2026, filling five vacant spots that opened when four officials retired after the 2025 season. Rick Patterson, Terry Brown, Boris Cheek, and Tom Stephan all hung up their whistles after last season, while side judge Lo van Pham was sent back to the college ranks, landing in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

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Vice president of officiating Ramon George pulled six of the seven new hires from the Southeastern Conference and the Big 12 Conference, leaving both of those leagues with some holes to fill on their own officiating staffs. None of the new hires worked at the referee position in college.

Among the more notable additions is Keith Parham, a side judge who was let go by the NFL after the 2013 season following a high-profile, playoff-deciding missed call. After more than a decade working in the ACC and then the SEC, including assignments at the College Football Playoff, Parham is getting another shot at the big stage.

Justin Larrew, another new hire, is the son of former NFL official Joe Larrew, who retired after the 2021 season. Legacy hires in officiating. Wonderful.

The rest of the new crew includes John Braun, Fred Dimpfel, Gabe DeLeon, Glen Fucik, and Stephen Ray. Because there are seven new officials filling only five vacancies, the NFL will carry swing officials in 2026, officials who rotate between crews throughout the season rather than being permanently assigned to one.

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All of that sounds relatively orderly. The backdrop, however, is anything but.

The NFLRA's collective bargaining agreement expires May 31, and concern about the gap between both sides has prompted the NFL to begin the process of vetting and hiring replacement officials for the 2026 season. The league has been recruiting from the college ranks,  including Division I, II, and III programs,  with formal training clinics expected to open around May 1.

The NFL issued a statement saying, "We are ready to continue negotiations to reach a fair and reasonable agreement, but in the meantime, while the union refuses to engage in a meaningful way, we will continue to prepare for the expiration of the current agreement because we will be playing football in August."

The two sides are not close. The average NFL official earned about $350,000 annually last season as part of a compensation structure that includes game fees, bonuses, meeting fees, preparation fees, and other benefits. The NFL has offered a 10% increase in game fees across the board in the regular season and up to 30% for those who work the Super Bowl. The NFLRA, for its part, is demanding raises closer to double that rate, plus over $2.5 million in marketing fees.

One person familiar with the situation put it bluntly. "We are so close to expiration and so far apart on economics that unless an act of God gets involved...," the individual told ESPN, leaving the rest to the imagination.

NFL owners have already begun preparing the regulatory framework for a world without union officials on the field. Owners approved a one-year provision empowering the NFL Officiating Department to correct any "clear and obvious misses" by replacement on-field officials that significantly affect the game.

NFL executive vice president Jeff Miller explained the thinking: "The negotiations with the officials have not gone as quickly as we would have wanted. We've made a number of proposals. We're looking to improve the accountability and performance of the officials, and we just haven't gotten to where we need to go. So, we're going to play football this fall, and we're going to need officials to do it."

The comparison to 2012 hangs over everything. That referee lockout lasted 110 days and spilled into the first three weeks of the regular season, producing officiating chaos that climaxed with the Seahawks' "Fail Mary" touchdown against the Packers, a play where replacement officials ruled a simultaneous catch instead of an interception, handing Seattle a victory that still makes Green Bay fans twitch.

All 32 clubs were required to submit their OTA and mandatory minicamp schedules to the NFL by April 22 so that the league could assign replacement officials to those practices starting June 1, the day the current deal expires.

Meanwhile, the NFL has also issued a gag order. The league sent a memo to all 32 teams prohibiting public comment on the CBA negotiations with the NFLRA, giving every coach, general manager, and executive a convenient answer for reporters: "Sorry, I can't comment."

The first time all officials, including the new hires, are supposed to meet together is during May. Whether that meeting happens with union referees or replacement zebras remains, at the moment, genuinely uncertain.

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