This is Unbreakable with Jay Glacier, a mental Wealth podcast build you from the inside out. Now here's Jay Glacier.
Welcome into Unbreakable mental Wealth Podcast with Jay Laser. I'm Jay Glazer. I'm proud to be joints. So Super Bowl is behind us, but obviously officiating is always a big topic and for that I want to bring on my teammate at the NFL on Fox former head of officiating for the NFL team Bland.
You know, how are we doing, buddy?
I'm good man, I'm good dude.
How happy are you that you're able to come off a Super Bowl and not be screamed at by coaches and fans and you know, only by our producers, which is way better than coaches and fans.
Let me tell you the people at Fox Sports, the producers, the executives, They've got nothing on NFL head coaches. Let me say, I love working at Fox and one of the biggest things I love is not dealing with angry coaches.
Yes, yeah. Let me ask you this. When you're leading up to a Super Bowl, does everything get tighter in the.
League office or you know, like, how is it leading up to the Super Bowl?
What happens where the league office.
There's so much attention obviously that happens in officiating in the playoffs. Is it just it's just another week or it gets tired out of the approach things.
No, it definitely ramps up. When you think about regular season. I mean, you've got two hundred and seventy two regular season games and they're all kind of happening on their own. The league office is monitoring everything the different areas. But when you get into the playoffs, now there's one game at a time, there's there's obviously more people watching and there's more focus from the league office. You think about the NFC and AFC championship games, the league really runs
those two games, and then obviously the Super Bowl. So a regular NFL game, regular regular season, you might have, you know, you might have ten people from the league office. Championship games, super Bowl you've got one hundreds. So it ramps up, and obviously scrutiny, the pressure, everything is more intense.
Take me through just what they do with the officials, like the week, that goes into what you guys would do with the officials.
Take me through Monday's or Sundays, Sunday.
Sure, so the crew gets notified actually right right before the divisional games, so actually right after the divisional round game, so the crew knows that that Monday, that Tuesday they know so they can start preparing for the game. Typically the crew will get in Wednesday or Thursday of the week before the game, So ten days out you're saying no, no, no, not ten days out, So you try to keep it
as close to regular season. You typically go in the day before, so they try to keep the officials kind of isolated from all because, you know, the Super Bowl there's so much. There's events, there's parties, there's all this stuff going on. New Orleans is crazy, right, So you try to keep the officials kind of kind of isolated
from that. They'll come in Wednesday or Thursday. Thursday night is probably one of my favorite events of the year because before it really starts to get down to the the meetings and the walkthrough and everything else, they have a big dinner with their families and it's a celebration because just like the players and the coaches, this for a lot of these officials, this is a dream come true.
If it's their first super Bowl, this is what they've worked their entire career and sometimes their entire lives from when they were young and started officiating. So that opportunity on Thursday night to celebrate with the people, because you make so many sacrifices in this industry, right to celebrate
with those people that have sacrificed so much. Right, you miss birthdays, you miss graduations, you miss all of these things during football season, and to say thank you to those people that are closest to you, that's one of my favorite things. Then Friday, there's a walkthrough at the stadium. They practice the coin toss. People don't realize how much the freaking coin to has to get practiced, and this
and that, and then they're watching film. They have an all day pregame on Saturday, going through film talking about the two teams. And then Sunday get there. Typically a regular season game, you're there two and a half to three hours before because it's the Super Bowl and all of the security and all the extra layers. They're there about five hours before kickoff and just kind of preparing leading up to the start of the game.
How much extra do they get if they get chosen from the Super Bowl.
Well, they get there's a there's a postseason fee that that is, it's really not that much more than it would be for the regular season where the compensation comes in. Any official that meets the performance standard, which is set before the season. Any official that meets that SANTS standard gets like the teams do, they get like a postseason bonus when they go further and further in the postseason, So they get a postseason bonus and it's split amongst
all the officials that qualify. So that's a pretty pretty good number. It could be up to about thirty grand and then the game the game fees are you know, depending on seniority, anywhere from like maybe seventy five hundred to ten grand. So, but they don't do it. You know, when you get to that level, it's not about the money. It's about the experience and the opportunity to say, hey, I worked at the highest level.
Traviswede have a Mental wealth podcast you just call mental health. Do you have officials come to you in the past and then come to you when they just have performance anxiety and they just have anxiety attacks before a games, during game whatever?
It is no question. We really you know when I was there wasn't I started in the mid nineties, right, So you think about just in general, what we what we did for mental health and mental wellness nowhere near what we're what we're doing today, and more aware of what's happening. And officials, I mean, I've seen officials that make a call and maybe it's the wrong call and
it's a big game, and they their world crumbles. I mean, you go back the official who you go back to nineteen ninety eight at Seahawks fourth down, viny Testaverdi ruled the touchdown Jets. When Seahawks lose, Seahawks don't make the playoffs, the entire coaching staff gets fired. That official who made that call went into such a deep depression that the entire community, the officiating community, the family had to help him get out of that. And so you see that.
And officiating is interesting because it's a negative environment. Nobody is there's no pats on the back. People understand that when they get into it. But it's not like referees in any sport leave a game and there's a lot
of people going great job, ref It's very negative. And that's something we've really strived in recent years to say we have to provide our officials resources, mental health, mental wellness resources because it is so stressful, there's so much pressure and a lot of them need help.
Wow. Interesting, I remember.
Look, you know, I've been friends for a long time, so much so that by the way, just people know I broke the spy GI video and I kind of pinned it on Dean and Mike Pereira. Yeah man, yeah, which which you know, Look, I gotta leave bread crumbs and people still think you're the one that gave it to me, so I you know, whenever we go out drinking, I try and him and I got to sign you and then Mike, poor Mike just crumbled and ironically both guys are not working with me at Fox, and they
were but like you fucking asshole Glaser. But which I did tell the commission to Look, I'm gonna leave so so many.
Bread from curse on this. I can go asshole becauseole.
But I even told the commissioner listen, please don't do an investigation because I'm gonna leave so many bread crumbs to who it's not and you guys are just gonna there's gonna be so many people were hurt, and unfortunately Hu and Perrera are the easiest want to leave bread crumbs on because you're an officiating And funny because I actually let bread coumps about four people where you were the two that they like focused it on because Pereira just when they brought him in, it was like they
put the under the line.
He just crumbled and he just fucked up.
By the way, neither one of these guys give me spy game Probviously I would even bring it up here. But being friends with over the years, the last couple of years, I saw a big change in you. And what I mean is last couple when you were still the league where I was no longer able to have a conversation with you at dinner because these coaches hit you a non stop to.
Bitch at you and it didn't stop.
And it was like, detan be present here, And You're like, I can't, Like it doesn't stop now?
And I think that more.
You know, we are so much closer because of social media to you guys and the coaches and everyone now has an opinion. Back in the day, there's three insiders, right, there's meet four well father, There's me, Mort Clayton, Lynn Pasquarelli and Peter Kind. National insiders.
You know it was it.
Now there's a billion, right, and there's everybody has a voice. Sure, yeah, I just saw a decided market. And it's just like, I'm glad you got out of that to come to Fox, which was a much better existence. But I saw a huge downturn in your mental health for those two years, and I would tell you about it, like, dude, these guys, you got to put some boundaries up.
You're like, I can't.
It was no question, and look, I'll be honest, everything in my life suffered. That was one of the biggest reasons people say, Look, I don't I love the NFL. I grew up in the NFL. It was my first real job out of college, and I stayed there for the most part, so I'll always be loyal to the NFL, the people, the league office. But I got to the point where that job was and I still loved it, but it was so all encompassing. Like you said, there's
no there's no time off. It's twenty four to seven, coach, They're grinding right, They're working eighteen nineteen hour days, so I've got to be available. But the problem and the thing that I think I did wrong for my mental health and really and it affected my relationships, my marriage, you know, everything. And I always felt like if a coach texted me or a coach emailed me, that I approached it, that that coach was standing at their computer or at their own waiting for me to respond. That's
that's the sense of urgency I put on it. And I and I and I neglected so many other parts of my life and it and it look at I was just not I was not good on the personal side of my life because of that. And and look, those are choices that you make. And one of the choices that I made was, Okay, I want a better a better just kind of you know life in terms of being able to do other things, not always being on call, and the ability to go and still work in the game and be a part of Fox Sports team.
It was life changing and it really affected everything from a personal standpoint in a positive way.
What are they calling you beat on Wednesday night?
Though? Looking at film, Hey we're playing the Chiefs on South Sunday. They do this or they do that. There, you know, it was non stop, right, You're getting calls.
You know.
What's funny is that right after I left so my life season was twenty sixteen. They did one more season twenty seventeen, and I think it was twenty eighteen. They basically incorporated a twenty four hour cooling off period where the coaches couldn't contact the league office officiating for twenty four hours until the game was over. And I'm like, man, where was that? When I was there, I had like I have like Sean Payton calling me at halftime like
like you know, so it was that. It was really oh yeah, oh yeah, no, I mean Sean's the best. We both love Sean. We worked with Sean. Sean was the one guy that the time. Yeah, if you if you're like, coach, no, the Earth is round, and he's like, no, it's flat. You couldn't convince him other way. Yeah, that was it. Nope, I'm not gonna you're you're wrong, I'm right and uh.
And so I got to threaten Sean bodily harm on more than one occasion.
He will get after you, and Rosie's going to stop me, like, dude, I will fucking choke you out and leave you in the gut or if you ever talked me like this, and he's like.
Oh, you're gonna do this now. I'm like, what the fuck did you say to me?
And Rose's like okay, okay, okay, commented we had we got into it like six am last year, and I was like, I will fucking murder you and he was like, oh, we're going there, and Rosie's like okay, okay, what's.
Yeah, let's start talk. But I remember you. I remember you. We won't name names, but I remember you at a super Bowl getting mad at somebody and kicking them out of their seat because you wanted Sean Payton to sit with us. But that that that's a different story if you remember that.
I don't remember that.
Okay, well that'll be offline. I'll tell you. No, you didn't kick me out of the seat. It was somebody else.
Oh I do remember that we were a Fox dinner, Yes, yes, yes, And because him and his wife were coming, that's why, that's why for Sean was with his wife and.
His dude was sitting there and he's like, no, you move, and I.
Was like, he got uncomfortable for a second, really uncomfortable, and I got loud.
And he shouldn't have been at the dinner. Yeah, yeah, because he was you know it wasn't somebody a part of the Fox family? And yes I did. That's correct, Sean. I like you said, you have a love hate, But keep keep talking about these guys with no.
But that you know there they'll call, you know, Sunday night, Monday there. Because these coaches are under so much pressure and their control freaks. Right, everything from an NFL schedule, right, everything is down to the minute practice, you know, all of it. And and so the one thing they can't control is the officiating. And and so it's a constant battle in terms of trying to understand and look, I I worked with so many head coaches, there isn't one.
People ask me who was the biggest asshole I can I can truly say I never dealt with any like real true assholes now could could could be.
No.
Bill.
Bill was the other way. Bill understood the thing that I loved about Bill when I dealt with him, he understood it. He's like, listen, I get it. He goes. I make mistakes during a game. Players make mistakes. Officials are going to make make mistakes. Bill just wanted to know what was going on. Hey, how are the officials going to handle this situation? How are they calling this. He just wanted the information. And like I said, I never had like anybody that was like that guy's an asshole.
Now could they be an asshole in the moment in that conversation, absolutely, you know, Iba Bruce. I mean, but he would just murder me, murder me. He'd be on I remember Thursday night, they're playing a Thursday night game. He's on the bus, mother fucking me after the game, you know, accusing me my first year. My first year, he accused me of not knowing the rules. My second year he accused me of cheating. My third year, he said he's never I'm never calling I'm never calling the
office again. Like that lasted like a week. So there's guys, you know every Tom Coughlin you know he gave you know, it was like forty five minutes one day on a Monday, just letting me have it. And his assistant is texting me while it's happening. Hey, Dean, don't take it personally. I get this three times a week. So it's just but in those moments and we talk about mental health and mental wellness, I really felt like a therapist in
those moments because a lot of that was venting. A lot of that was the coach they want They're under so much pressure, they just wanted to get it off their chest. And I always took the approach of I'm gonna take my emotion out of it. I'm gonna listen, and i'm gonna I'm gonna see what that person on the other end of the line needs. Does that person need to vent? Does that person need an explanation? What do do you need? In ninety nine percent of the
time we ended the call on a good note. Sometimes maybe, you know, there was a hang up and we had to have another phone call. But that's kind of the approach that I took because and those guys are under so much pressure.
Like I said, is there anybody ever pushed you so far over the edge? You're like, hey, like I would react.
Fuck you?
Yeah?
Yeah.
And I really liked the guy. But one time, I, I mean, Jerry Rees and I must have hung up on each other about three times in one conversation where I was just like, where not getting anywhere?
Former giants?
Yeah yeah, former giants GM, And we're not getting anywhere, you know, and and and you know, he said some things and then I said some things that that we probably both regret that that was like one of the few times, but you know that those things will happen when you're when you're talking about the emotions and the pressure.
How do they still fuck it up so much?
I think there's a disconnect between how we see the game on the broadcast and how the game is officiated on the field.
And it's just too much like there was a time where it's just like, let's lay off, and now that those times are gone.
Like no question, no question, And and and look when I first started, and this this goes back to you know, Paul TAGLIBUU commissioner Taglibo, we did you know, a play happened, it was controversial, and then and then everybody moved on that. The league rarely made statements, but in nineteen ninety five you could do that right because it was it was newspapers, it was you know, it wasn't the twenty four hour cycle that we have today, Like you said, everybody on
social media, everybody the internet. So now you so I think the league really I don't think the league has an officiating problem. I think the league has a transparency problem.
And I think that's where I think the effificiating problem because like the problem because they just called too much, like there is something on every single play you can call, sure, right, And it was Look when the when the replacement res came in, it was like, hey, don't call anything, don't be part of the story.
And they weren't.
It was great, And I just think that should be the directive, don't be part of the story.
There's no question that for for people most people watching the game, less flags is good, right, It's good. There's less stoppages, there's less let the players decide. I do think that over the years, when you go that far that way, teams tend to take advantage and and that now you have to kind of overcorrect the other way because if teams know, hey, they're not going to throw, and we've had teams that just coached it and have
been very successful. When you think about, you know, on the defensive side of the ball, Hey, if they're not gonna call holding an illegal contact, we're gonna do it on every play and maybe we get caught one set of ten ten times, but we win nine out of ten times. And so that's that's the fear with not calling anything. And it's a balance, but Look, officials aren't perfect. Yeah, they make mistakes, and I think the league is aware of it, and they're gonna try to, you know, hopefully
you know, correct some things with replay. But I still think you got to get to the root of the problem. Get good officials, get good training, get good people in the league office to to to, you know, to lead that crew.
So here's my suggestion, Roger Guell straight out ten years ago. I still think it's great idea. I said, I think you should get X special ops guys, Delta's seals, Marie Recon, guys who actually played football right know again, make them your officials because a they're common caasts, be physically, they can keep up with these cats right and be in a better position.
And see those.
Coaches ain't gonna fucking wear out an Avy seal who dealt it. They're not going to be screaming at it. And I still think it's a great idea. Plus, we're you know a lot of these guys come out of service and have a hard time finding work, and Rogers like, you're fucking crazy. I'm like, what, we know that, But I think it's a great idea.
I think the concept is when you when the attributes that you just mentioned, those are all things that will lead to a good a good official right the communder chaos, you know, the ability to keep you gotta be physically fit, and that has changed. Look when I first started in nineteen ninety five, if you know what the officials fitness test was at their annual clinic. They had to finish a mile. Not it wasn't timed. They literally they don't have to finish.
You could walk not and not die.
Really that was this is the requirement, and and and there were some that we weren't sure we're gonna pass. But but now now it's gotten so far the other way where where we have you know, we have groups that come in athletic training staff, those types of things that help these guys and these and these girls that get you know, make sure that because these are the
best athletes in the world. Now, look, you're not gonna beat Saquon Barkley to the goal line, but you have to be at a standard where you can be in position to see what you need to see. And I think that's something the league is aware. But I look, I love the idea I don't know about. We can't have former Navy seals choking out coaches on the sideline.
I didn't say that they don't have to choke. That wasn't the point.
The point is they're not gonna be as app they're gonna have more respect than a guy who's a part time fucking lawyer or full time lawyer or part time official. If you guy who served our country, they're gonna be a little less apt to.
And we do have you know, we have programs. You know, Mike Pereira has battlefields to the ball fields. We've got a lot, you know, you know with you you what what you've done with with with merging and all the things that I think we do have more people that are getting involved from from the military into sports, whether it's officiating or other other areas. So I think that's that's definitely something we need to explore.
So Diana and I we got to tell you guys how we met. I got he said it.
First off, let me tell you Jay's I didn't know. I didn't know Jay.
I met Jay.
But Jay, if you and I just want everybody to know, Jay gives off this persona and look, we're both we're both Northeast guys. Jersey and New York. I'm Long Island. He's Jersey, so so he gives off that kind of Jersey Long Island douchebag vibe. Sometimes I say that in a loving way, but you are not that at all at all. But initially I was like, who is this guy that's coming in and he was going to do a story, but gad you could take off from Yeah.
So I was coming in. Well, I definitely I got the Jersey New York attitude, that take can oatitude.
Of course I love a glasshole, right, yeah, with a big heart, so I think that the big heart and people didn't realize.
But I also look my mental health.
I created this character so people wouldn't really know me because I didn't feel worthy.
Of the real Jay Glazer, like I didn't thing anybody like him, So I created the glaze.
You know, this fighting joke, drinking, cursing, it's not too far from who I am. But it's also I I definitely inflated.
It's a version. It'sion, But I hid the heart I say over the years, right and now I leave with my heart.
But one of the things I always do though, and I write my book too. One of the biggest things I do for my darkness, my gray is laughter. So I'm probably the biggest practical joker in the league, right But whether it's a Fox or even the league, like I do the craziest shit to people, and like I sent out a text message to a whole league one year, and I think I even said in the commissioner, Hey dude, some shit just went down. Your name came up, my
phone's about to die. Call at this number at the hotel and when you called it, it was the sex chat line for like five ninety nine minutes.
Yeah, that's perfect I had.
I had people called for their I never forgot Mike, Tomlin and Bro. I called my team phonus and not my problem click Rex Ryan too, Like fuck, it was like all he's got straying.
Rex may have been calling that line.
Yeah it was called anyway people, but some I forget who the coach was, and it was Rex that he heard the music and stuff from this porn line and he thought I was in a club.
Okay, stayed on in Jay Jay. So it's racking up the minutes, you know.
And anyway, real real quick on Rex, he sent me the greatest text message any coach has ever sent me it was he was with it. I forget it was fourteen or fifteen. He was still with the Jets. Week one, they lose and they get called for like twenty five fouls, and he texts me after the game. He says, Hey, if we're gonna get fucked like that again next week, let me know and I'll bring the lube. I mean that. I'm in the text like, oh yeah, all right, coach.
Yeah, I mean that's the greatest of his greatest character.
So I play a lot of jokes. And I was at CBS at the time I came into it. This is ninety two thousand one or something.
What did you get it? It was early two thousands.
Yea, right, So sett along those lives and I come in to do a story for CBS sports Line Dot Common Inside Store of what happens in the fisherating department. So I come and I do this great story. But at first I wrote a fake story. And I had this story about how these guys gamble and they have Fantasy Football League, and you know this that they'll find guys like and I have quoting guys.
You know what was your quote like?
Because you were in charge of finds like, yeah, sure, Sometimes personal feelings come into whether we find a guy who figures Anthony dor Set right, Anthony door set.
Sometimes we'll find him, but sometimes we won't find him.
Because we liked his dad, because we like to this guy over here is a dick, and so we'll find him fifteen rats, and you know, all these things like oh, you have a fantasy football league, so sure we'll we'll look the other way of guys on our team, you know.
And greg Iello, who's the former head of PR for the league, he's in on it with me.
He comes in and you tell him right, he threw like ten copies and all of the right and said what he said, I let this guy in and this, yeah.
This is what we Yeah, this is what and and people start looking at and Jay wrote this fake story about all this stuff, and it was literally Lord of the Flies, you know, people turning on each other.
Like immediately like keep going there like I didn't say this.
I didn't say that. Yes you did, I say, And I'm just sitting back and I'm looking at Jay. I'm like this motherfucker, I went there at that point, you tell me to like you were the only one, Like yeah, I was like, guys, wait, this is not real, Like why you like? Literally, they just turned on each other and I was like, this is ridiculous, Like I heard you.
Say this right, They're like no, I didn't like and Pereira always had a heart attack that day.
Oh my god.
Yeah, of no doubt.
He crumbled like a house of cars.
That was my By the way, I used to do this to a lot of coaches and gms. I'd write fake articles. Yeah it would look perfect, right, and I would send it over and just guys would oh they would collapse and yeah there was Yeah. I did this several times and man, I had it down to science when I could figure out how to photoshop.
Yeah, we've been friends ever since. You know, could have went one, could have went one of two ways.
So you know, I'm gonna ask you this question. I asked all my guests.
Give me the one moment in your life could have been anything to your unbreakable moment, could have broken you shouldn't and didn't.
As a result, you came through the other side of that tunnel stronger forever.
That's a good question. So couple come to mind. But there was one. There was one time, and it was right around two thousand and eight, and I was at the I was at the league. And for me, you know my background, I never officiated on the field. I didn't, I didn't come up. I'm very unique in that background. I started as an intern. I just I was lucky enough to get an internship at the NFL officiating had an opportunity and I took it. So I never officiated
on the field. And I was basically told, not officially, but told, hey, listen, you'll never be the head of the department. You just you never officiate on the field. It's a glass ceiling. You'll never do it. And I was struggling. I was struggling with it. I didn't know where my career was going to go. And sitting there in two thousand and eight, I was married, didn't have kids yet. I was struggling a little with my relationship and everything else, and it was really getting me to
the point where I just was lost. And in the league had at that point had offered an enhanced severance package for people that were there, you know, more than more than ten years. And I was and I was like, am I going to leave the NFL? Am? I going to leave this? This company the people would bend over backwards to work for. And I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew that I was I knew that I had the potential to run that department and I and I took a chance, and I left.
And I remember sitting in my office when this thing came across, reading this email, and I was like, and I struggled with it and left, started my own company, moved from New York to California, had my first son, and who's you know, you know how that goes incredible and credible, and then the league hired me back in twenty twelve, and I became the head of the department in twenty thirteen. So I don't know what if I, if I didn't go down that road, where would I
be today? And I always think about that. Had I just kind of succumbed and and kind of said, you know what, felt sorry for myself, where would I have ended up? And I have no idea. I don't know. You gut on yourself. The show was slave without me? Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I just bet on myself. But believe me, I wasn't I wasn't a noble and I struggled with I really didn't. I said, you know, I could probably stay here like this and and it would be okay, But I got to take that chance.
It was.
It was the scariest thing that I've ever done. Really, it really was from from that standpoint and uh and and it worked out, thankfully.
Brother. I appreciate you, man. I look, I apologize for playing that joke on you back then. I apologize for pinning spygate on you and Pereira. No, I actually don't apologize for either one. I appreciate you joining me here
All right, man, Love you, Love you, buddy.