(PhatzRadio / USA Today) — An underthrown deep pass hung in the air, bringing together Indianapolis Colts safety Jermale Hines and St. Louis Rams wide receiver Chris Givens.

The football hit the ground, pass incomplete. Back judge Dave Hale, an NFL replacement official with South Carolina high school experience, hesitated, then struggled to pull out his penalty flag to call defensive pass interference Sunday at Lucas Oil Stadium.

During his halftime interview, Colts coach Chuck Pagano said, “They got a big play on us off a deep P.I. penalty that was questionable.” A day later on a conference call, Pagano said he was still unsure about the penalty after reviewing the play several times.

Watching the game from his Zionsville home, longtime NFL head linesman Mark Baltz didn’t even consider the call questionable.

“It was totally wrong,” Baltz said Monday. “Incidental contact all the way. They were all playing the ball, there was incidental contact, the ball dropped. Due to a lack of experience, (Hale) waited two, three, four seconds before he ever threw the flag.”

Baltz is not an unbiased observer. He is a veteran NFL official who, with other members of the NFL Referees Association, is locked out by the league in a contract dispute. Their absence has hardly gone unnoticed, with escalating criticism of the replacements after one round of NFL preseason games.

The regular officials aren’t full-time employees. They have other jobs. New officials make $3,000 a game. Experienced officials make up to $8,000 a game. The league says it has offered a seven-year deal with annual pay raises of 5% to 11%.

Baltz, 64, who is looking forward to returning for his 24th season — “If I ever get back,” he says — has been replaced by officials with college and high school backgrounds.

“I don’t see that the players and owners will put up with this much longer,” Baltz said. “The integrity of the league, I think, is at stake.”

Mike Pereira, the NFL’s former vice president of officiating and now an analyst for Fox, is among the critics of the replacements.

“They’re really in over their heads,” Pereira told NESN television.

Greg Aiello, NFL senior vice president of communications, defended the replacement officials.

“Overall the officials did a good job for the first week of preseason, and they will get better,” Aiello said. “There were some mistakes as there are every week of every season. We have been training the replacements for two months very intensively. They will continue to improve.

“We have an aggressively fair proposal on the table that is also designed to improve the quality of our officiating. We hope the NFLRA will recognize that and reach an agreement soon.”

Baltz, who scribbled a page of notes about the Colts-Rams game, said the problem stemmed from replacements lacking training and experience.

“My first couple years in the league, pass interference was a tough call for me, but after you’ve seen a thousand of them, they become very easy,” said Baltz, who worked college and high school games for 21 years before joining the NFL.

“You can see they’re uneasy, late to react. The head linesman is supposed to flow on pass plays when the quarterback drops back. The head linesman (Sunday) just stood there like a statue and never moved.”

A first-quarter play caught Baltz’s eye. A defender jumped, which caused an offensive player to move.

Flags flew.

“They got together to decide whether it was a false start or a neutral-zone infraction, whether the guy got in the zone or not,” Baltz said. “They’re having this conference and, all of a sudden, here comes a flag from the back judge and he’s got delay of game.

“That was terrible.”

As treasurer for the NFL Referees Association, Baltz is in constant communication with his colleagues. Longtime official Ed Hochuli e-mails videos for officials to review as well as exams each week.

While confident this dispute will be resolved, presumably before the NFL games count, they can’t help but wonder how long it will linger.

Until then, they are watching games and finding errors: holding calls missed, officials out of position and forward progress improperly marked, among other things.

Baltz mentions how the NFL generates more than $9 billion in annual revenue and shakes his head.

“They’ve got the greatest game going in professional sports,” Baltz said. “I just can’t understand why they’re tinkering with this, over some little economic problems.”