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Originally Posted by Nevadaref
Agreed.
Wow, if you folks have a bunch of 35-40 yr olds with 15-20 yrs of exp, then you are either very fortunate or are doing your recruiting, training, and retention very well. I'd guess that most of them are in the 7-12 yrs of exp range though and that is how long I think that it takes to really become a top level official.
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Well, I doubled checked with real data. My estimations were off just a little...by about 5 years. Of our tourney officials, we actually have several in their lower 40's and a few in their late 30's with the average being in the mid 40's. I don't have data on when they actually started but I know that all but a couple were established officials when I started in 1993. Additionally, all of them are very fit atheletically.
We do have a fairly low turnover after the first few years. A lot of new officials come in thinking they'll get varisty games in 2-3 years and are disappointed when they realize that it's not going to happen. There are a lot of good officials with 5-10 years experience in line for the varsity games. A newer official will not likely pass them up unless the newer official is clearly better (it does happen). If you work at it, your schedule will steadily improve.
The good retention probably comes from a longtime, steady leader that doesn't typically shuffle people quickly up or down. He's been the commissioner of our association longer than all but a few of our officials have even been officiating....something like 30 years. The retention of more experienced officials would dramitically degrade if you started pushing guys back down before they really couldn't do the job only because a younger, faster official was only just as good. It's a little bit old-school...with loyalty to those who've delivered for you in the past until they show they can't do it anymore.