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[BlueDevilRef]

Originally Posted by Mbilica

This is an interesting perspective. In my side of Connecticut, we have a few preps and one postgraduate school which hire 3 officials for every game. But those games really are at a higher level than the regular high school game.

The fees are interesting. Basketball costs a LOT less to a school than football, despite the fewer games in football. That is because in football, each of the 5, 6, or 7 on field officials get the same varsity fee as any varsity official in any other sport, not to mention the equipment and larger coaching staffs. Plus schools hire another official to work the clock and pay him or her approximately 2/3 of a varsity fee. (If only we had paid timers in basketball!) Yet, football is not nearly the kind of cash cow in CT compared to some other states.

I have long advocated that schools hire 3 officials for soccer, basketball, baseball, and softball. The ADs I talk to are actually in favor of it. It is worth the money to them. Our local middle school conference even voted to have 2 officials instead of 1 for JV middle school games. At every level, the game gas become more of a wide open game, with teams spreading their offense, running the full court press on defense, and shooting more shots from outside the arc than working it into the post. I think most people would easily see the benefit of paying a 3rd official. The issue isn't the fees, it's lack of enough referees. It is the same problem in soccer, where the state uses 2 man until the state quarterfinals (I believe). Just not enough refs...

I do a lot of fastpitch and I really don't think we need 3. Maybe 5 plays in an entire year could have needed a third guy. To me, most softball games that have three are just for "looks". A lot of the rotations are just a guy who was in a pretty good position moving to another good position and being replaced by a guy to have the same look. And if it meant getting paid less, then absolutely don't want it. I just don't think it is necessary on a 200 ft field.

[Mbilica]

Originally Posted by BlueDevilRef

I do a lot of fastpitch and I really don't think we need 3. Maybe 5 plays in an entire year could have needed a third guy. To me, most softball games that have three are just for "looks". A lot of the rotations are just a guy who was in a pretty good position moving to another good position and being replaced by a guy to have the same look. And if it meant getting paid less, then absolutely don't want it. I just don't think it is necessary on a 200 ft field.

3 man is very helpful in a number of situations, especially with runners on base. The play at first base with the field umpire in C position is a difficult sell. Double plays can also result in difficult calls back at first. I had a couple plays last year with multiple runners on base and we weren't able to directly observe the tag at first on fly balls to left field. One in particular looked bad for us because we had a play at the plate after fly ball was caught down the line, and the field umpire was only able to get the runner leaving from 3rd. The ball got away from the catcher and the run scored. The catcher then tried to throw out the runner from first, who had tried for 3rd. The ball went out of play. The defense then appealed R1 failing to retouch. We called her out, but we were only guessing. She seemed to have never gone back because she got to 2nd very fast, but my field umpire visibly had no idea on the appeal. Thankfully, we were correct, according to both coaches.

So, I'm not saying that we need 3 umpires very often. It doesn't hurt, and sometimes helps in critical situations. The big problem in all of these 2 man systems (baseball, softball, and soccer) is we only go to 3 man in the later rounds of the playoffs. There, we screw up the mechanics because officials are unused to working 3 man.

I will freely admit, that in many games where I work 5 man in football, we could have gotten away with 4. When I work soccer in low level games, many times I could get away with just 1. The same is true in an uneventful basketball game. However, you never know when you'll need that extra official.

When working 4 man in JV football one game as the referee, we had a collision on a deep pass play in which the the wing official was blocked out, so he didn't have a flag for DPI. The coach was livid. All I could think was that it was a $60 call. That is, $60 would have gotten another official and we could have covered that play.

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