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Liability Issues
I actually had some games this past week where liability could have been a problem:
Varsity girls. First year varsity program at a new magnet school. I'm the referee. Pregame. Home coach tells me his players will be greatly overmatched (he was right, they lost 57-2), and that he will likely go to running time in the second half. I tell him to check with the other coach at halftime, and get back to us. A make a mental note to check the NFHS rule book at halftime, however, coaches decide between the first two periods to go to running time in the second period, after checking only with my partner. At home that night, I go to the NFHS rule book and discover that in a varsity game, the coaches and officials can shorten the periods. Here in Connecticut, we have not opted to go to running time as a "mercy rule". What if someone had been injured in this game, and blamed the officials because "my daughter may not have been playing if we shortened the periods to four minutes instead of going, illegally, to running time"?
Junior Varsity girls. As the varsity official, I'm responsible to get to the site early to watch the JV officials and give them feedback. I get there in the second period to find only one official is working the JV game. I speak to the site director, who tells me that no JV officials showed up, and that she called "John", who was local, who came right away to do the game by himself. As our board custom in these circumstances, I ask the site director if she wanted me to get dressed to help "John" in the second half of the JV game, and if so, she should get permission from the two varsity coaches. We decide that I will work with "John" for the second half. By the way we have over 280 officials on our local board, and recently merged with another local board, so I don't know all the officials, but I did recognize "John". I'm ready to go by the third period, and we're doing fine. Between the third, and fourth, periods, "John" and I chat and I discover that he was an official, but is no longer on our local board. For half a second, I consider asking him to step off the court, but, he's doing a great job, better than some of our rookie JV officials, he hustled to the site to help out the school, and he's already worked three periods, so we finish the game together. What if a player had been injured in that game, a game in which I knowingly allowed a noncertified official to work?
Lawyers. Can't live with them. Can't live without them.
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