Quote:
Originally posted by zebraman
What I have seen in my local area is that good veteran officals often tend to get lazy in regards to high school games. They quit going to camps, they stop reading the rule books (especially our college officials who think that they can get by on their "presence" rather than continuing to study the rules and mechanics of NFHS), they get a little lazy in their pregame conferences and they forget coverage areas for 2-person games.
Z
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Z,
It sounds like you guys have a bigger problem in your area.
I almost hate the fact I used the word "presence" about two years ago, because I think folks have taken that to mean that you are not concerned with the rules of the game. One does not exclude the other. You have to know the rules, but you also have to know how to communicate with coaches and players and handle yourself on the court. Just because I have people skills and can speak well to coaches, does not exclude me from reading the rulebook or understanding what mechanics I should use.
I am sure that things are different in your area, but in my area the college officials are usually the best to work with. They are the ones that constantly go to camps and constantly are trying to get better. And in our state it is required to maintain our license to attend camps every 3 years. Of course there are some that wait the 3 years, but many go to at least one every year. Of course you get guys that lose sight of their mission on the court and stop paying attention to a lot of things, let alone the rulebook. In my opinion that is not because they aspire to have more presence. That is more because they forget what might have got them to where they are. But the officials that constantly get playoff opportunities are usually people that have the entire package to some extent. There is always an official or two that some might think to themselves, “how did they get there?" But they usually do not get there by messing up major rules in big regular season games or playoff games.
Peace