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Whistleblower
A recent new book about basketball officiating by Bob Katz: "The Whistleblower: Rooting for the Referee in the High Stakes College Basketball" made several noteworthy points. I will just cite 2 of them here --Please critique them:
1) "Many of the skills that are instrumental to succesful officiating--knowing the rules, understanding their permuations, can be acieved through enough book study and real-world practical experience; however, the crucial skill that will either promote an aspiring ref or doom them to mediocrity is 'decisiveness'.
2) "Every ref knows s/he could be one ugly sequence away from the purgatory of everlasting castigation. Officiating blunders that most sharply affect careers are mistakes on important calls that occur in the last two minutes of closely contested games. Mess up this type of call, you will get pummeled not only by coaches and fans, but also the media--and there is no statute of limitations--[the pummeling can go on forever]."
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