SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE DONE ABOUT THE OFFICIATING

[bigwes68]

Just as I always say when one of these threads comes up....

 

If you think you can do better, get out there and do it yourself. It is people like you that are keeping qualified persons from wanting to become an official. They don't want to leave work early, drive an hour or more each way, and run up and down a basketball court for the better part of 3 hours, all while being berated by fans that think they know everything, for a measly $65.

 

Do you have people pay 4 or 5 bucks to come to your workplace, stand 5 feet from your desk and yell at you for 3 hours about every single mistake you make? I didn't think so.

 

If officials truly were cheating like you say and it was discovered, I'd say they'd be banned for life. But it just isn't true.

[Vol Fan]

The Greenfield/Union City girls game at Trenton was poorly officated last Saturday nite as well. Sounds like it is a growing problem all over the state. Way to many of the officials want to BE SEEN in these big games. When will they learn that the people come to see the players and not the officials. The best officials are usually the ones that go unnoticed.

[miker]

The primary problem is simply the way the game has evolved into a physical contest based mainly on the "let 'em play" attitude of the officials. This is pure hogwash. If a foul is a foul and it is called, then eventually the players will adjust and the fans will become less irate. Now granted there will always be second guessing, but if the game is brought back under control, then the crowd is less likely to become unruly and the players themselves will begin to play less physical. With all this said, the head of the TSSAA officials must train officials to call games with more consistency and not be so concerned with the intangible aspects of officiating (ie. making sure they stand at a certain place during a timeout, being more concerned about a shirt not tucked in, than hand checking, making sure the ref's arm is straight when calling a foul vs. calling over the back on a rebound)The list can go on and on. You start at the beginning of the season, all official are trained and instructed on what is to be called and all coached are to be made aware of this at the beginning. Second, they must stick to their guns and not change during the season and certainly not change from quarter to quarter or half to half. Reasonable consistency must prevail. Currently this is a sport, not for basketball players, but for the athletic player that has the advantage based solely off athleticism. The NBA has ruined the game and most officials have been forced into it's trap. It may be time for a change for the head of officials at the TSSAA; but at least a time for improvement.

[bigwes68]

The primary problem is simply the way the game has evolved into a physical contest based mainly on the "let 'em play" attitude of the officials. This is pure hogwash. If a foul is a foul and it is called, then eventually the players will adjust and the fans will become less irate. Now granted there will always be second guessing, but if the game is brought back under control, then the crowd is less likely to become unruly and the players themselves will begin to play less physical. With all this said, the head of the TSSAA officials must train officials to call games with more consistency and not be so concerned with the intangible aspects of officiating (ie. making sure they stand at a certain place during a timeout, being more concerned about a shirt not tucked in, than hand checking, making sure the ref's arm is straight when calling a foul vs. calling over the back on a rebound)The list can go on and on. You start at the beginning of the season, all official are trained and instructed on what is to be called and all coached are to be made aware of this at the beginning. Second, they must stick to their guns and not change during the season and certainly not change from quarter to quarter or half to half. Reasonable consistency must prevail. Currently this is a sport, not for basketball players, but for the athletic player that has the advantage based solely off athleticism. The NBA has ruined the game and most officials have been forced into it's trap. It may be time for a change for the head of officials at the TSSAA; but at least a time for improvement.

 

Nice post. I agree with everything you said. You have some very good officials that call it the way a game should be called, but because their mechanics are not the greatest, they don't get any post-season games. And that is a shame. I wish it were more consistent across the board, but unless you go back to the 60s and 70s philosophy of calling EVERYTHING, that isn't going to happen. I whole-heartedly agree with you that the NBA has been the ruination of pure basketball. Dr. Naismith put in the rules that he did because he didn't like the physical, brutish nature of other sports (football, for example) and he wanted a clean, smooth game. It started out that way, but all that is gone. I would like basketball more if we could get it back to the way it was.

[options86]

Watched a game tonight that involved a ref that officiated the worst game I had ever seen a couple of years ago. All week more than one team was complaining about him. One coach requested that he not ref his game again. Guess what, he was the head official. Best game I had seen officiated all year and we lost by 7 points. The kicker is that Ronnie Carter was there and casually observed. Anybody can put on a horse and pony show for one night, my question is why can't they do it all the time.

 

Some fans pay admission to yell only at the officials, thats part of their job. Thats why they make about 15-20 dollars an hour. When teams get down they start picking at officials, that part of the ignorance that officials deal with. But I know people who work jobs that pay a whole lot less and put up with more crap for a whole lot longer. So deal with and work to be more consisted!!

[finfan]

Exactly. I was being facetious about the irate fans. Wonder why they are so irate? We're not all crazy...This is a real problem; a safety issue. There's also the issue of bad officiating affecting the outcome of the game and it being unfair for some teams. Especially this time of year, let's get the best OBJECTIVE officials on the court.

Should have seen the officiating in the 1st three games of the 4AAA tournament. Refs were favoring Murfreesboro teams in the girls games. The

White County game was so bad that it was a 10+ to 2 ratio late in the 4th. Guess who won that one?

[CycloneFan]

The Lenoir City crew sent to District 1AA that called the Unicoi-Rutledge boys game and EHS-GP girls game. one ref in particular, was horrible. Their supervisors and TSSAA should get those tapes to review.

Edited March 2, 2006 by CycloneFan

[east10acbball]

I attended the Heritage vs Powell game last night. The game certainly got out of hand by the officials. The officials did not make the difference in the game because it seemed that Powell had one of their best games while Heritage had one of their worst of the season. Powell did shoot 47 free throws to Heritage's 23. The issue I had with the officials was the professionalism. Two of the officials were over on sidelines having their photos taken with a Powell player during the pre-game warm-up. This was very unprofessional of the refs. This did not make them look very good. All officials should be more professional and know better than to visit with fans and players pre game...the happy photo was a bit too much. Great season Lady Mountaineers!! Good luck to Powell and Farragut.

[PHargis]

The primary problem is simply the way the game has evolved into a physical contest based mainly on the "let 'em play" attitude of the officials. This is pure hogwash. If a foul is a foul and it is called, then eventually the players will adjust and the fans will become less irate. Now granted there will always be second guessing, but if the game is brought back under control, then the crowd is less likely to become unruly and the players themselves will begin to play less physical. With all this said, the head of the TSSAA officials must train officials to call games with more consistency and not be so concerned with the intangible aspects of officiating (ie. making sure they stand at a certain place during a timeout, being more concerned about a shirt not tucked in, than hand checking, making sure the ref's arm is straight when calling a foul vs. calling over the back on a rebound)The list can go on and on. You start at the beginning of the season, all official are trained and instructed on what is to be called and all coached are to be made aware of this at the beginning. Second, they must stick to their guns and not change during the season and certainly not change from quarter to quarter or half to half. Reasonable consistency must prevail. Currently this is a sport, not for basketball players, but for the athletic player that has the advantage based solely off athleticism. The NBA has ruined the game and most officials have been forced into it's trap. It may be time for a change for the head of officials at the TSSAA; but at least a time for improvement.

This is a very good post. Back in October I posted comments about not picky fouls but the way some officials are interpreting incidental contact rules. Incident contact rules are being stretched to the extreme and are the reason for some injuries. There is no way one player can push another player clear across the floor and a foul not be commited some way. FourAAA, in my opinion , was officiated properly in the games i saw. Wednesday, there was only 3 calls which seemed to be to the extreme. Two were clearly favoring the defensive team in a catchup situation. Percentage wise, that probably is not bad and the benefit of the doubt but to have a set of referees confer and it is obvious , while may not be intentional, their intent is not good. Most schools film their games and should send in the films that are pertinent. First things come first and before money becomes an issue, the Association oversite must get better and clearly get better. The associations clearly know the officials that are keeping them continually in trouble. This does not mean there are not 80% good officials. There are and they are Referees that have great personal relations with the Coaches, players and fans but they should be able to come down on any of the three if need be. This may not have anything to do with calling the game. Consistancy between regions may be some of the problem but to continually to allow the incidental contact rules to be stretch on the basis of trying to reach NBA standards is against everything high school basketball is all about. I amy be wrong but if an association continues to stretch the rules and films are sent in and it is clearly seen rules are being stretched, the association should be prohibited from furnishing officials until the officials on the assocoation requalify themselves to earn that right. If officials think they are underpaid, let the association grade them and their pay be quided according to the results they achieve, more and less. Fans don't like it if referees don't call like they are used to but the worth of a team means that they and the coach and the fans can adjust to the game being called without the official stretching the rules. FourAAA had some calls that may have had some mistakes but the quality seemed to be quite high when comparing it to some of the regular season contests. Of course, as a thought, i may be a little partison also.

[cheerchick_07]

On official has never cost any team a win! For every one bad call there are at least ten things that the losing team could have done better to help them win the game! The coach and players need to concentrate on what they can do to change the out come of the game not what the official can do. Two of the best girls coaches in the state rarely speak to an official during the game. (Randy Frazier and David Russell) You wont change an officials mind, nor will you influence their decisions. Cheer for team let the stripes do their job.

CC

[bubba71c]

On official has never cost any team a win! For every one bad call there are at least ten things that the losing team could have done better to help them win the game! The coach and players need to concentrate on what they can do to change the out come of the game not what the official can do. Two of the best girls coaches in the state rarely speak to an official during the game. (Randy Frazier and David Russell) You wont change an officials mind, nor will you influence their decisions. Cheer for team let the stripes do their job.

CC

 

You can influence an official. If you rub an official the wrong way, they won't hesitate to make quick calls against you in any sport. They do have an impact on the game as well.

 

I honestly believe that most people would not have such a problem with the officiating if the calls were consistent. I know several people have posted they have been to games where one team had 10 fouls and the other had 2. The calls need to be consistent in every game.

[midtnblu]

You can influence an official. If you rub an official the wrong way, they won't hesitate to make quick calls against you in any sport. They do have an impact on the game as well.

 

I honestly believe that most people would not have such a problem with the officiating if the calls were consistent. I know several people have posted they have been to games where one team had 10 fouls and the other had 2. The calls need to be consistent in every game.

 

 

So you are saying if both teams have 25 fouls at the end of the game, then that means the officiating was consistent? No matter what happened during the game or if one team is more aggressive than the other or one teams reaches in more than other or if the defensive pressure from one team is NOT consistent with the other team? Just as long as the foul totals are consistent.

 

Just checking...