NFL and CFL announce joint officiating program

The NFL and the Canadian Football League on Friday announced that they've partnered to form the NFL-CFL Officiating Development Program.

As part of the program, a group of NFL officials will work as part of CFL crews during preseason and regular-season games in that league in June and July, before starting their NFL season at their annual officiating clinic in late July.

Several CFL officials will then get the opportunity to join the NFL's Officiating Development Program, designed to train top officials in all aspects of league officiating. According to an announcement posted by NFL Communications, the NFL's development program includes attending NFL minicamps and training camps, officiating preseason games, studying position-specific film with veteran NFL officials, reviewing mechanics and analyzing rules differences between the NFL and other leagues, like the CFL and college football.

Since there are significant rule differences between the NFL and CFL, NFL officials sent to CFL games will primarily be "deep wing" officiais, side judges and field judges, to minimize some of those differences.

"Any time our newer officials can get more reps on the field, during practices or games, that will make them better officials," NFL vice president of officiating Dean Blandino said in the release.  "The collaboration with the CFL will certainly benefit us as we prepare for the 2016 season and we look forward to welcoming our CFL officiating counterparts to our development program later this spring."

Glen Johnson, the CFL's vice president, football, said in the release. "This historic partnership gives officials in both leagues an opportunity to hone their craft and get better through shared development activities and more snaps at the pro level. We're excited that a group of our officials will actively participate in the NFL Development Program and now have a formal path forward to be considered as prospects in their league."

We can all agree that better officials is a good thing. Still no word from the NFL on what exactly constitutes a catch, though.

2016 NFL draft