Notwithstanding last night's disaster, I agree. Plus, you see these guys huddling to discuss calls a lot more, which is the right thing to do (and may be a little theater to delay while NY calls in on their headset).
Corrente was being an asshole last night -- but increasingly, these refs are being totally failed by the league:
"Make taunting a point of emphasis."
"Go easier on offensive holding."
"Don't blow the whistle after the fumble (but get the call right!)."
"Protect the players heads and knees."
"Read our latest masters dissertation on what constitutes a catch."
I don't think the NFL referees are a particularly impressive bunch -- but this is a ton of shit to balance, consider and pull off with millions of mouth breathing fans watching. The problem, as always, is that the league has no integrity. Sure, MLB has a lot of problems too. And the NBA under Stern was a shitshow in that regard. But those leagues, by and large, are trying to get it right. The NFL, by contrast, lets its owners' individual and collective agendas pollute the game. Mara hates Kraft/Harbaugh and Colts hate BB/, hence Deflategate. Jerry and Snyder have each others backs on salary cap fuckery, so the league goes easy on both of them. Polian is pissed Ty Law owns Marvin Harrison's soul, let's make it impossible for DBs to be physical with receivers. Tomlin is mad his team's TE lost a game-winning TD in prime time against the Pats, we'll change the catch rules IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SUPER BOWL, And of course, the league in general is in a perpetual state of existential crisis, hence they do anything and everything for PR reasons -- including all the player safety puffery, about 50%-75% of which is for show (ie, fans like kickoffs, so we'll keep them even tho people still routinely get lit up).
For all the problems I have with MLB, the NBA and NHL, I don't think they have even close to the integrity problems the NFL does. And at the end of the day, the people enforcing the integrity of the game are refs. So there you go.