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Originally Posted by JRutledge
This is not an NBA philosophy. This is a Men's and Boy's basketball philosophy at least in the Midwest. And the rules support it. This is what the incidental contact rule deals with. If you call all contact on all blocks, you will never have a block. Very rarely is there ever a one on one block and you are not going to have some contact.
I do not know what game you are calling or who you are calling it with, I see this called quite often where I live and at the college level. One of the things is the shooters flop or emphasis their fall to get a call. When they get run over, this gets called.
I can tell you if you live around me and you have a quick whistle on a block where the shooter causes all the contact, you will be relegated to working girls basketball only. You cannot call fouls on a 6'6 player that blocks and 5'6 guard and expect the 6'6 player not to at some point make contact with the little guard. Also I do not see many of these blocks where the little guy does not get knocked down. You cannot just call a foul because someone is big if you ask me. Also this is not s slippery slop because all sports have philosophies and practices that are used and interprets the rules in a certain way. Just like the "area" play in baseball and the holding philosophy in football. I have yet to see a rules committee have any problem with these applications of the rules or try to stop this kind of rules philosophy.
I also think we need to make clear, this was a D1 camp!!! This was not some local HS camp where the clinicians only worked a state final because they hung around long enough. This was with D1 officials as clinicians and league supervisor where his games are on National TV every week. We also must know that D1 coaches know these philosophies and they have no problem with them. If you call this at that level, you will not be there very long and they will find someone that will follow the philosophy. This is not very different than when I worked my very first D1 baseball game, there were things I had to come to up to speed with or I would get run over and soon find myself not working their anymore. I know similar things happen in football because I belong to a football organization where several Big Ten crew chiefs and 3 NFL officials and what they have to do is very different than what we have to do at the HS level. Now where I live also the college influence is heavy and many assignors at the HS level, also assign college assignments and expect similar things from the college level. We are also influenced by the fact that many conferences have players that go to the D1 level or at the very least low level college ball all the time.
I think this also needs to be said. The people at this camp mostly were college only officials. Not many guys here worked more than 5-10 games of HS a year and did not see a personal future for working HS ball. I know I found this unusual from where I live, because even the best college officials where I live work a decent share of HS games and even work deep into the playoffs. The only D1 Men's official that works almost no HS games, he helps assign a HS conference and he expects similar philippics to be applied in that conference or you will not get his recommendation to work varsity to the lead assignor, which can make or break your chance in that conference BTW.
I agree that this is essentially a class of cultures in the officiating world, but depending on where you live you either go along, or sit out at the varsity and higher levels.
Peace
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I officiate about a dozen boys varsity games in Illinois each year (driving down from Wisconsin) and Rut is right about how basketball is called there. It's fast, physical, and fun to work if you aren't whistle happy. That said, I'd call a foul in a heartbeat if contact after a blocked shot put a player in the stands.
It's quite different than the play and the expectations of the officials in rural Wisconsin, where one of the assignors sends out a letter each year reminding officials that most contact should result in fouls being called and that the games are called too loosely for his liking. There my partner and I turn down the advantage/disadvantage meter a bit and everyone (so far) has been happy. You gotta do what the boss wants you to do.
Regional differences abound at the high school level. Good officials become aware of these things very quickly and are able to adapt to those expectations. Again, I find nothing noble about doing what we do. It's a job and those that hire set the guidelines if we want to work for them.