Land Clark, Don Willard to the NFL

[agpennypacker]

As noted in the NFL thread, the NFL has hired PAC-12 referee Land Clark as a FJ/SJ and Big Ten referee Don Willard as a SJ/BJ, along with four other officials. 

www.footballzebras.com/2018/03/29/6-officials-hired-by-nfl-for-2018-season/

Congrats to all 6. I will miss Land and Don on Saturdays, as both are high-quality refs, but they are certainly deserving of the call up. I wonder who will replace them as white hats in their respective conferences.

Also, with Scott Novak and other talented officials widely rumored to be next-in-line to replace retiring NFL referees in future seasons, I wonder how long Land and Don will have to wait to move up.

[FredFan7]

What strikes me is that Land Clark is 56 years old. Usually the window closes on officiating candidates at age 50. Clark may be the oldest rookie pro official since the very early days of the AFL. He's certainly the oldest rookie in the Super Bowl era.

That said, he is very physically fit and I'm sure if he avoids injury, he can put in a good 10 years.

[mike]

Didn’t realize he was that old. I thought age was one reason Mike Defee was passed over. Maybe the league wants to groom Clark to eventually replace someone in management, but wants him to have on field NFL experience first?

[lefty17]

If the NFL ever adds an 8th official they may a few more "older" officials to lessen the impact of having so many first year officials.