cover image Born to Referee: My Life on the Gridiron

Born to Referee: My Life on the Gridiron

Jerry Markbreit, Alan Steinberg. William Morrow & Company, $16.95 (272pp) ISBN 978-0-688-07938-3

Probably the National Football League's best-known referee, Markbreit, with the aid of Inside Sports contributor Steinberg, tells how he achieved that stature and what his work involves. He began his career as a referee of amateur games around Chicago, his home town, became an official for college contests and eventually one of the top arbiters in the Big Ten. Like a player, Markbreit was scouted and finally appointed to the NFL. An official's life in the pro league, we're shown, is taxing: hardly a day passes that a referee does not review the rules or concoct hypothetical situations in which he is called on to make difficult decisions. And each game is physically exhausting, for it demands almost the same endurance from a 52-year-old official as it does from a 25-year-old player. Photos not seen by PW. (September)