Quote:
Originally Posted by Johnny Ringo
Teams come from miles away because they advertised registered officials? That's a new one.
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That's pretty much how my Catholic middle school assigner got into the assigning business. This happened over thirty years ago. He, as a veteran high school varsity basketball official, had heard about some poor officiating in Catholic middle school games in his hometown, so he observed several games at the request of some coaches. These schools took their basketball very seriously, with boys, and girls, games played at three different age levels. What they didn't take seriously, however, was the officiating. They would use nonparticipating coaches to officiate these games. Of course, this led to a lot of arguments, that was just getting out of hand, especially for a church based organization.
He sat down with some coaches and offered to get together a group of certified high school varsity, and junior varsity, veteran officials to work these games, but at a cost. The schools would have to offer a reasonable fee for these certified officials, and the schools would have to not schedule games on Tuesday nights, or Friday nights, the two busiest nights for high school basketball here in Connecticut. The coaches in his hometown agreed, and when Catholic schools in nearby towns found out about this, they also got on board.
He now assigns for fourteen Catholic schools, and has thirty-six officials that he can assign. He has negotiated, what I believe to be, very reasonable fees. The fees vary from level to level, and for various multiple game assignments, but just to give a few examples: Varsity boys/girls doubleheader (eighth graders, seven minute periods) $84.00 for both games. Junior varsity (sixth graders, six minute periods) $30.00 per game, usually assigned as three, or four games, almost always on a weekend.
In return for the very reasonable fees, he expects a lot. Arrive ten minutes before game time. Officiate in full high school uniform (no sweatpants, no sneakers). Enforce all equipment rules (jewelry, undershirts, headbands, wristbands). Enforce all sportsmanship rules, keeping in mind that these are Catholic school games. He expects veterans to mentor officials new to our group. In other words, act professionally at all times. The only concession is that we don't switch on fouls all the time, we switch when convenient, kind of like the way some of us work our off-season AAU games.
It's great. Really good basketball. Good coaching. Big crowds. Cheerleaders. Complementary food from the concession stands. Good partners (a highly select group, I don't know how I got invited). Almost all games are within a fifteen minute drive from my home. It's like I died, and went to Catholic school basketball heaven.