LAIRD HAYES

Richard Dunn

Even in his finest hour, Laird Hayes, the NFL official, was his

own toughest critic, overruling himself on a couple of issues that

nobody watching Super Bowl XXXVI last season would notice.

When Hayes received his Super Bowl XXXVI ring at the NFL Officials

Association union meeting last May, it didn’t represent a dramatic,

last-second, game-winning field goal by Adam Vinatieri to lift the

New England Patriots to a 20-17 upset victory over the St. Louis

Rams.

“I made a couple of boo-boos, so I was a little disappointed in my

performance,” said Hayes, who made his Super Bowl debut. “The ring to

me doesn’t represent the Super Bowl and the Rams losing to the

Patriots. It represents all the people along the way who made it

possible for me to be there, starting with my wife, Maggie, who has

been a saint.”

Hayes, in his eighth year as an NFL side judge, points to a couple

of breaks along the way and some influential people who helped him

design a flexible schedule at Orange Coast College, where he’s a

physical education instructor and head men’s soccer coach.

“When Barry Wallace was the Dean of Athletics at Orange Coast, he

made it possible for me,” said Hayes, who at the time was a Pac-10

Conference side judge and would sometimes get Saturday assignments in

Washington or Oregon and needed an accommodating Friday shift at OCC

to make it happen, even if it meant missing a soccer game.

Hayes, on the other hand, tries to be as flexible as possible in

the OCC Athletic Department, teaching aerobics, table tennis --

anything former and current OCC athletic directors Jane Hilgendorf

and Fred Hokanson would ask of him.

“We’re resurrecting surfing this fall,” a proud Hayes announced.

A Princeton graduate by way of Santa Barbara’s San Marcos High,

Hayes started the OCC surfing team in 1978 when a couple of students

approached him about it and he was serving as the college’s Assistant

Dean of Students, a role he filled from 1976 to ’85.

After a few years working at the district office as Director of

Community Relations, Hayes was assigned back to Orange Coast, this

time in 1987 to fill the role as men’s soccer coach.

Hayes had little experience in soccer, but the district was

slashing funds and implementing hiring freezes on coaches. It opened

the door for Hayes to return to OCC and his longtime former assistant

coach, Mauricio Claure, was instrumental in the Pirates’ 1989 and

1991 state championships.

A Newport Beach resident, Hayes broke into officiating as a

Princeton undergraduate student, starting with intramural basketball.

“I’m not really sure why I started. I guess to make a few extra

bucks,” said Hayes, who attended graduate school at UCLA.

Inspired by his late father, Will, he turned his attention to high

school basketball and soon was a member of the Los Angeles Basketball

Officials’ Association. Hayes worked his way to the varsity level,

then it became small colleges, then a few years later baseball

entered the picture. “I figured I knew the strike zone, because I was

a catcher in baseball,” Hayes said.

Hayes never thought about football until 1976, when he was hired

at OCC and Wendell Pickens told him about the Orange County Football

Referees Association. In only his third year, Hayes said he got his

first big break, when veteran crew chief Larry Arason liked Hayes’

work and insisted he join his crew the following season.

One day, Hayes met his future Pac-10 official mentor, the late

Dave Kamanski, whose nephew at the time rowed on OCC Coach Dave

Grant’s crew. Two years later, Hayes and Kamanski were operating the

West Coast Football Officials Clinic, which lasted for 10 years.

Hayes, who started officiating community college football in 1980

after meeting South Coast Conference assigner Don MacKenzie, hooked

up with the Pac-10 in 1983 as a side judge.

“I never thought about the NFL. It never crossed my mind,” Hayes

said. “I always thought that was for other people.”

Hayes, who didn’t get on a full-time Pac-10 officiating crew until

1992, first applied to the NFL in 1990, upon the Kamanski’s

recommendation.

After the NFL scouted him and Hayes passed a series of

psychological tests and FBI background checks, he became a finalist

for an NFL spot in 1993, then received the big call in 1995.

Hayes, the latest honoree in the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of Fame,

misses his family during the 25 weekends a year in which he’s out of

town, but he tries to make up for it during the week. He frequently

picks up his son, Andy, 11, from school and watches his water polo

and football practices. His daughter, Katie, 20, will be a sophomore

at UCLA.