Yellow is becoming the new red, at least it looks that way in the NFL.

Every Sunday, and a couple other days in the week as well, pro football games are stopped dead in their tracks by yellow flags flying out of the hands of officials.

It has gotten so bad that viewers are now celebrating when a play isn’t followed by a penalty.

It wasn’t that long ago when a well-officiated game was one when you never noticed the guys in stripes. Now you look for them on every play.

All the penalties is making games harder and harder to watch.

Because of it, the NFL has yet another problem on its hands.

In a season of troubles, the league now must find a way to fix this one on the field fast.

Already struggling with domestic violence and child abuse cases, it appears the league has lost track of its product on the field.

The off-field woes have taken the headlines. Add to those the concussion lawsuits and you can see why the league appears to be under siege.

Football itself is under fire as parents are questioning how smart it is to let their kids get their brains scrambled on a weekly basis.

But not one of those issues will have a direct impact on the game as much as the flagfest that is taking place this season.

Sad as it may seem, none of those are forcing fans to turn off their television sets on game day.

No matter how bad it gets off the field, it is what happens on the field that counts to NFL fanatics.

Nobody is turning off the games because Ray Rice or Adrian Peterson are appearing in court and not on the playing field.

What will kill viewers is if the game continues to be slowed or stopped by a blizzard of penalty flags that continue to litter the turf game after game.

Protecting players from cheap shots is one thing, turning every throwing situation into a guessing game is another.

It seems nobody can explain just what pass interference is anymore. Even the officials appear to be guessing when it comes to some calls.

Worst yet, those guys in the zebra outfits are deciding games, weekly.

Their interpretations of the new rules, or the new way of enforcing those rules, is what has turned the professional game upside down.

There seems to be a new offensive play in every team’s playbook, one where the receiver runs down the field as fast as he can and the quarterback throws the ball as far as he can. Then at the end you hope for a flag.

It is working in more than a few cases.

This all started during the preseason when the league came out and said it was going to clean up the game more than a little. Proclaiming it was nothing new, just better enforcement of current rules, the NFL instructed its officials to call just about everything. They did.

Worse yet they still are.

This is not just pass interference, it seems like calls are being made on both sides of the line at an alarming rate. Players are not mugging for the officials, trying more than ever to buy calls with their actions.

Too often it works.

Yet it is the pace of the games that is the worst part. Forget the length of time it takes to march off so much yardage in one afternoon. The real problem is all games are having trouble getting any flow going.

Too many stops have left players standing around.

It is also giving viewers more time to click to another channel.

That is about the only thing that really gets league officials’ attention.

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Jim Gazzolo is managing sports editor. Email him at jgazzolo@americanpress.com(MGNonline)