It seems to me that some of the difficulty in calling/no-calling such contact is inherent in the wording of the "Incidental Contact" statement:
4-27-3 . . . Similarly, contact which does not hinder the opponent from participating in normal defensive or offensive movements should be considered incidental."
The language used in this statement, implies that the "opponent" is the individual player who received the contact, and not the team, to which that individual opponent belongs. The extension of the perception of effect of that contact, to the teammates of that individual opponent seems not to be the intent of the statement.
Thus, the contact initiated by A1 on opponent B1 seems to elicit a judgement of the effect of that contact, only on B1, with no regard to actions by B1 - such as a pass to B2. It is the disconnect of those two actions - the contact on B1 and the pass to B2, that tends to cause further scrutiny by other parties, such as the coaches of the two teams.
Game management, game flow, game interrupters - in the form of calls that influence the overall play - are terms that may be used regarding such points of philosophy.
It is very hard to teach newer, inexperienced officials, appropriate appliciation of such philosophy, when they are struggling to "just get the calls right." The over-reach of such philosophies, beyond the written content of the rules, can be judged from extremely varied, and disparate points of view.
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To be good at a sport, one must be smart enough to play the game -- and dumb enough to think that it's important . . .
Last edited by Rob1968; Fri Jan 16, 2015 at 10:12am.
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