God Strikes Down NFL Referee Ben Dreith, Whose Terrible Calls 44 Years Ago Haunted Generations of New Englanders

Source -  Ben Dreith, the NFL referee known for a no-nonsense demeanor and his idiosyncratic penalty announcements that made him the first household name in NFL officiating, died at his home at the age of 96. He was the oldest living NFL official at the time of his death on April 25, which just publicly disclosed today.

It is a tad unfair to begin to summarize a long stellar officiating career by one loquacious description of an unnecessary roughness foul, but to start anywhere else would willfully ignore his most recognized highlight of his career. When Jets defensive tackle Marty Lyons was getting in some post-play shots on Bills quarterback Jim Kelly, the referee who wore number 12 threw his penalty flag. Ben’s booming baritone voice echoed through the swamps surrounding the New Jersey Meadowlands as he announced the most famous penalty call in NFL history, bar none.

Yeah, that's a cute moment. If you're going to be remembered for something, it might as well be a wacky penalty call that has been a staple of football highlight shows and podcast introductions for decades. 

But that's not what Ben Dreith will ever be remembered where I come from. If you're from New England and a member of the Greatest Generation, the Korean War era or a Boomer, his name will live in infamy until the Heat Death of the universe for one thing and one thing only. The biggest bag job in the history of pro football. 

The year: 1976. The place: Oakland. The event: the AFC Wild Card game, Patriots at Raiders. 

I wrote about it in detail in my first book (cha-ching), because in a lot of ways, it's my origin story. The event that made me the dark, brooding, vengeance-fueled superhero you know me to be. If I was Bruce Wayne, that game would be my parents getting killed in an alley. 

John Hannah is the second greatest player in franchise history. And he's on record as being convinced that the fix was in. The city of Oakland had a referendum on the ballot to increase taxes in order to build a new stadium and keep Al Davis from moving the team to Los Angeles. And his theory is that the NFL wanted a Raider victory to make the electorate happy so they'll cough up the money. Russ Francis would never go that far. But he did concede, "That was the only game in my 14 years in the league where I felt something was wrong. There had to be something there. … All I know is I've played hundreds and hundreds of games, and that's the one that sticks out. 

Pats coach Chuck Fairbanks held back only slightly more. "The weakest officiated game I've ever been a part of," he said. "They did a bad job. Terrible." 

I'll get to the most infamous call ever, but just as a warmup, the Patriots were sitting on a six point lead with under five minutes to play and had the ball at midfield, a couple of 1st downs away from running the clock down and sealing the win. On a 2nd & 8 from the Raiders' 35, Sam Cunningham, a 230 pound back, inexplicably stepped out of bounds shy of the 1st by an inch. Hannah to this day will tell you the chain gang held the marker one yard back and that Cunningham only stepped out because he was convinced he'd picked it up. 

Then on 3rd & 6 (after a legitimate false start call), hit Francis right in the sternum with a perfect pass that would have been enough for the 1st. Except it bounced off the tight end's chest and hit the ground. The reason he didn't catch it is because linebacker Phil Villapiano had him in a bear hug, Francis' arms pinned to his sides.(See the 13:50 mark.)  An official was right there. But the flag stayed in his pocket. A subsequent 50-yard field goal try was no good. 

And the final straw, the worst call in the history of egregiously bad, gawdawfully terrible calls, was the Roughing the Passer on Ray Hamilton. After driving the ball down inside the Patriots red zone, Ken Stabler found himself facing a 3rd & 17 with under a minute to go. (See the 16:40 mark). Hamilton came clean off the edge was lunging for Stabler, made contact with the ball still in the QB's hands, Stabler released it, incomplete. Until the recently departed Ben Dreith threw the flag. I think it's fair to say that penalty was the most tragic thing that's ever happened to a great American named Hamilton in American history.

Even if you see that replay and think Hamilton deserved the flag for hitting Stabler on the helmet, you need the kind of history lesson you won't find in a Broadway musical. It was not illegal to hit a QB's head in those days. There was zero justification for the call. To say the Patriots were apoplectic would be an insult to apoplexy. Fairbanks went totally apeshit. His team became unhinged. Defensive end Mel Lunsford picked up an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Hamilton picked up one on the subsequent play, and another on the play after that. A couple of plays later, Stabler punched it in on a keeper, and the hopes of a team that had gone 3-11 the year before and 11-3 this year, were crushed. 

As were the dreams of a certain blue-eyed, tousle-haired boy from Weymouth. Irene and Bud's baby boy would spend the rest of his childhood and most of his adulthood still trying to get over the affects Dreith's diabolical plot. Even when the Patriots got the benefit of the Tuck Rule 25 years later against the same team, I wasn't satisfied. Because the Tuck was called correctly. The Roughing the Passer Game is still a crime against humanity that hasn't been avenged. The universe still owes me one. 

It was so bad that the NFL didn't assign Dreith to do another Patriots game for 11 more years. But the damage that was done could never be undone.

And now the official behind it all is finally gone. Cut down in the prime of life at the tender age of 96. As Father Cavanaugh says in "Rudy," We pray to God in our time. The answers come in His time." I'm sorry for the Dreith's family's loss. But four decades later, I'm still sorry for New England's.