Referee's

[AcidReducer]

The problem is referees have zero accountability in their job performance. If they are terrible at their job, nobody in the TSSAA cares. Nothing happens. There is no punishment. But I don't know how you fix it unless you leave the TSSAA. Nobody wants to be a ref because of the difficulty of the job. Because of this, they're allowed to make whatever horrible call they want with zero repercussions. The TSSAA and the refs have the coaches, schools, and players bent over a barrel.

[hsbbfn]

There was a young man who absolutely loved his job as a referee, he was not only one of the best young referees he was one of the best PERIOD ! He took pride in his appearance, performance and every aspect of his job ! He was one that even when a call went against you, you knew that it was most likely the right call. Unfortunately he passed away due to illness at age 29 last year. TSSAA should show video of his games to new and veteran officials to show how it should be done ! Not mentioning his name but coaches and players know who I'm talking about. His father by the way is a pretty darn good referee also.

[hsbbfn]

We wouldn't have been able to keep him though because he was already calling some college games. No doubt in my mind he was on the fast track to where he wanted to be which was major college and then NBA. He was a great young man !

[warmachine7954]

Usually the good officials will move up. They'll do some high school and college together. When the chance arises and they will move to college full time.

 

I umpire baseball. I understand how mistakes can happen from an officials part. I also understand my ability as an official to smooth things over or make them worse.

 

I try not to give the officials a hard time in basketball games because, let's face it, there are rarely games where the refs decide the outcome. 

 

Yea, your team lost by 3 in OT on a bad call late in the game but your team went 6-17 from the FT line. 

 

Yea, you lost by 1 in regulation on a bad offensive foul call but your team turned it over 22 times. 

 

It's a thankless job and some people pay their money at the door just to go home with a sore throat from yelling at the official. 

[hsbbfn]

Yes sir you are absolutely right, the main problem I have with officials is laziness which gets them out of position. It really makes it hard on the other officials. I would rather have a good two man crew that hustles than a lazy three man crew.

[RealisticFan45]

IMO....I think there comes a time that one must evaluate themselves and know when to call a quits. There are a lot of older officials that just cant keep up with todays game speed. Whether its from overweight, knee replacements, health issues, vision, hearing or whatever, i have seen it all. One official delayed the start of the second half of a game due to him eating snacks, come to find out he wears an insulin pump so I guess he had to regulate his sugar! Just let it go! 

[MDLTNHPZ]

Hey it can always be worse. I saw on twitter this morning in Michigan a high school game a fan was on the floor during a time out having a discussion with the officials and one of the referee pushed him. They officals then ran off the floor and call the game. I have no idea of the content of the discussion or why the fan was on the floor in front of scorers table.

[old24eagle]

We have got to pay em more. Its hard to hold anyone accountable for the low pay that they make. Most of em travel pretty good distances to call games and by the time they pay for gas and food for the night they have made about 60$ to call two games. I dont know many people who would tolerate the work but also being scrutinized and evaluted every night for that amount of money. I guess to make a long story short..."you get what you pay for".

[Bobcats83]

I think the $60 number is a low but average high school game lasts about an hour 15 minutes but lets say 1 hour 30 minutes so 2 games is 3 hours which would be $20 per hour.  I don't make that

[FCRebel22]

Why can't they be evaluated after each game by coaches. Or do they even allow. They can at least get an idea of how they called. I sure some coaches might be biased based on the outcome of a game or not even care, but at least they would have a voice and have no excuse.

[Fan15]

Pay is not the issue in my opinion.  Schools can't afford to pay a three man crew more than what they are getting now.  20 dollars an hour is well worth their time.

[TheTruthHurts22]

Coaches can and do request certain referees not officiate their games, trust me most coaches talk to the assigners for TSSAA. That gives them some kind of idea of who are making friends or enemies in an area or what refs they should put calling a single A game compared to AAA games.

Edited February 15, 2017 by TheTruthHurts22