I SPORTS 1
Judge On The Gridiron
NFL referee Jerry Markbreit's 33-year career has taken
him from B'nai B'rith touch football to the Super Bowl
MIKE ROSENBAUM
Sports Writer
erry Markbreit graduated
from the University of Illinois
in 1956. He soon got married,
landed a job with 3M and be-
gan to officiate youth football
games. Today he is still married to the
same woman (Roberta), he still works
for 3M (as a trade and barter
manager), and he still officiates foot-
ball — as the National Football
League's only Jewish referee.
"I don't quit anything," says
Markbreit, who was in town last week
to speak about his book, Born to
Referee: My Life on the Gridiron, at
the Jewish Book Fair. "I enjoy
everything that I'm doing. I don't
want to be anything different."
Markbreit played football for two
years in college, but gave it up. "I was
just too small," he says. "I got killed.
So I decided I'd try my hand at of-
ficiating."
Starting in B'nai B'rith touch
football, Markbreit grabbed every of-
ficiating job he could get. "I put a lot
of time in and a lot of effort," he
recalls. "I worked every level of foot-
ball, worked as many games as I
could. I had games every day of the
week my first six or seven years. I us-
ed to leave work at 3 in the afternoon
and worked freshman games, gram-
mar school games . . . I felt the more
experience that I got and the more
contact with other officials, the bet-
ter I would be?'
Markbreit did not look at this
workload as his ticket to the NFL. "I
always looked to the next level only!'
Meanwhile, the heavy schedule
"was terrible on the family." His wife
"complained but — I kind of listened
to it and kept on officiating.
"It's gotten worse over the years
because it's not just being out in the
afternoon and coming back or work-
ing on a Saturday afternoon. I'm gone
every weekend for half the year and
it's tough on her. But she's been ter-
rific. Even though she complains a lot,
she's been with me. We've been mar-
ried 32 years:'
Last week, Markbreit and his
crew of officials got their one weekend
off for the season. He will not be wat-
ching football games. "My wife and I
will go out and do anything that she
wants to do," he says. Does that make
up for the time away? "It never makes
up for it, but I try!'
1,11
52
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1988
Jerry Markbreit makes his point at Book Fair.
One chapter of Markbreit's book
is devoted to Roberta and her feelings
about her husband's career.
Roberta is not a football fan. "I
never felt that I had to push the foot-
ball on her, but I did do what I wanted
to do. I don't think you can succeed at
something and try to be everything to
everybody. In my case it was probably
as much of an obsession as anyone
could have. I've spent the last 33 years
doing nothing but thinking, eating
and sleeping football. So you ask why
I'm in the NFL? That's the reason."
Markbreit was an 11-year Big 10
conference referee when he applied to
Glenn Triest
the NFL. "I never even thought about
the pro league for years," he explains.
"All of a sudden one day I thought,
`Well, I've done everything there is to
do. I wonder if I'm good enough to go
into the National Football League, or
if I'm good enough for them to even
consider taking me: So after a few
years of debating myself I took the
risk of applying. Once I applied I was
scared to death that they'd take me.
I was at the pinnacle of collegiate of-
ficiating. I was one of the top-ranked
referees in the Big 10 for a number
of years. I could've stayed there for the
rest of my officiating life .. .
"Of course, when you go to the
NFL, you go in as a neophyte no mat-
ter how great you were in college. I
started as a 41-year-old rookie at a
position that I'd never worked before,
as a line judge. But it was just as
much fun as college, even more so.
And I quickly became a referee" in his
second NFL season.
Markbreit estimates that an NFL
official has one-thousandth of a se-
cond to make a call. "I'm always sure
when I make the call!' he says. "But
then I re-play it again and again and
again and sometimes I have doubts.
`Did I see what I thought I saw?' In
99 out of 100 cases I in fact did see
what I thought I saw. Once in a while
you make a mistake. But in most
cases your instinctive first reaction is
the correct one. But that comes from
years of training!'
When he or any NFL official
misses a call, even if no one at the
game notices, the official will hear
about it. Every NFL game is filmed,
and the league reviews the quality of
the officiating each week. The of-
ficials then receive a graded report
from the league office.
"It's kind of a masochistic profes-
sion," says Markbreit. "You wait all
week for the game to come and then
you worry all week, after the game,
until you get your film review and
your grades to find out how you did.
But that's kind of what makes it so
exciting."
Markbreit says it is no more dif-
ficult to referee an NFL game than
any other level of football. "I've been
doing it for so many years that it's se-
cond nature to me . . . I don't feel that
these games are any tougher than the
grammar school games that I had 33
years ago, because I've been doing it
and doing it and doing it. The most
comfortable place I am in my life is
out there on the football field."
Markbreit spends 20 hours
preparing for each game. He takes the
NFL's weekly exam and prepares a
review program for his seven-man
crew. He also reviews the rules on his
own, using a 10-page checklist.
"My football rules are in a brief-
case next to my bed every day of my
life. They go to work with me every
day. I carry two briefcases — one is my
business briefcase and one is my foot-
ball briefcase." Markbreit works in
3M's Chicago office.
Officiating, says Markbreit, has