[ChuckElias]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by rainmaker

Yea, that's easy for you to say... but you said you'd let us know how the results of the try-outs turned out, and you didn't do that!!!

You're right Juulie, and I apologize. Below is a copy of an email that I sent to Drake and Dan with only minor modifications:

I just wanted to let you know how it went this weekend at Fordham. The players were there for the US Junior National competition. I guess this is a chance for the state's best HS juniors/seniors to try out for a national team. It also serves as an college scouting combine, from what I understand. This was a much better experience for me than the "tryout" two weeks ago. I worked 5 games over the course of the day (2 girls, 3 boys). The girls talent was not very impressive but there were some very good boys there. In any case, I was glad to be officiating instead of sitting there watching all day. The only drawback was that there were only 3 or 4 people there to watch us work. Tom Palmgren (assignor for the league) was there, as well as the guy who gave us our rules talk last time. And a young guy named Zach, who works the USBL and the NADL. He was the best guy to talk to. When I wasn't working (I only had one game before lunch), I just stood with him and we talked rules and situations. It was an amazing learning experience.

I was asking him about the various types of fouls (away from the play, clear path to the basket, flagrants) and the different penalties. When I asked about elbow fouls, he talked about why they try to stay away from elbow fouls (like HS officials stay away from multiple fouls) and how you might handle a hard elbow if you didn't want to call the elbow foul. The 2 hours of talking to him was worth the drive to NYC.

Anyway, this event was kind of the opposite of the last one. Last time, there were plenty of observers but you only officiated 20 minutes. This time, I worked all afternoon and got observed twice.

There are plenty of things for me to work on, obviously, but one of the hard things to get used to is how soon in the possession they want the Lead official to rotate. In college, we're told to wait until the ball settles on one side. But at the pro level, they want you to rotate to the ball side almost as soon as it comes over midcourt. After coming home, I watched the Lakers game and, sure enough, ball hits the frontcourt and BANG, there goes the Lead. The only problem with that is that, without a shot clock, you're like a ping-pong ball bouncing back and forth as the ball gets swung around 20 times.

So over all, it was a good experience (and hey, I got a free T-shirt out of the deal!!) and hopefully, I'll know this week if I get any games. If we're asked to do another "workout", then I'll just say "no thanks" and move on. Either way, it's been an interesting process to go through.