[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Dan_Ref:

I think you are confused as to what officiating your primary means. Yes, we as officials strive to get every call correct. An official, depending on whether he is in the L, C, or T, is given an area of the court to officiate. If every member of an officiating crew were to watch the ball 100% of the time, 80% of the players and their actions would not be watched. That is not good. Officials who make it a habit of making calls out of their primary are ball watchers. How do I know that. I have officiated too long and evaluated too many officials.

Ball watchers very seldom make the correct call when they make call out of their primary because they almost never see the entire play. They never see the entire play because they are out of position to make the call. More importantly, when an official ball watches he/she is abandoning his primary and that can spell disaster.

In my game last Friday night, the R from the C position had four players directly in front of him and he left them to call a travel on the ball handler who was directly in front of the T. The C was at least 45 feet from the ball and actually move toward the division line to be able to see the ball because he could not see through all of the players in his primary. To make matters worse the player with the ball did not travel, he just made a funky looking stop to his dribble. How do I know? I saw the tape of the game today. The V coach could not understand why the C was making the call right in front of the T.

Bart made many good points about officiating in your primary. The basic premise of a two-person officiating crew is that there is one pair of eyes on the ball, and one pair eyes off the ball. When one starts watching the ball when it is not in his/her primary that is an equation for disaster. There is nothing wrong with stretching your coverage in a two-person crew outside your primary, but it should be in the context of off ball officiating. The court is quite large for only two pairs of eyes, and a lot of monkey business can happen off the ball. The basic premise of three-person officiaing is to really split the off ball coverage between two officials.

Since you live in New York, I am going to assume that you belong to an IAABO Board. I would like to suggest that you talk with your Board Interpreter about what Bart and I have been saying in this thread. If you know who Roger MacTavish is, you might want to chat with him also.

Have a good remaining season.

MTD, Sr.