Not at all interesting to me.

Nobody wearing a belt would get HIRED at the D-1 level. The same people making those decisions may or may not care about shoes.

Must be a state rule. NFHS manual says primarily black shoes, not entirely black shoes.

I'm not talking about the D-1 level. I'm talking about all the snide remarks about belts at any level.

But if there is a rule in the book for D-1 officials shoes, but some choose to disregard it "because they can get away with it," why is that okay?

Interesting: 12/13 book says:
2.1. ART. 1

The official's uniform shall be a black-and-white striped shirt, black pants, entirely black shoes and socks.
When did this change?




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I'm looking at the 15-17 Officials Manual.

"or shoes approved by an individual conference" is good enough for me.

The belt people crack me up.

Basketball officiating pants are sold beltless. The people I see wearing belts around here are wearing Dockers or pants with white pockets or pants that fit poorly when it comes to running up and down a basketball floor.

I asked someone once why he didn't buy pants specifically designed for officiating. He told me he could get the pants he bought for $15 at Sears. Enough said. He just didn't care enough to buy the right pants. Same guy was still wearing a 100% old-style polyester shirt, which anyone with any sense stopped wearing YEARS ago.

I know of one official who worked at a high level in the last 15 years wearing a belt -- Blane Reichelt -- and he retired in 2005.

The new pants out in the last few years (the 4-way stretch pants) are super comfortable and look good and I just don't understand why anyone wouldn't just buy them.

2010 Air Max all leather. Blacked in the swoosh. Replaced them with Zigs a couple of seasons ago, but made my way back to the Air Max. The best shoe ever.

Rich, have you tried shoekicker.com for those AirMax?

I knew a guy that wore pants with belt loops. I never asked him about this personally, but my understanding he hardly ever worked varsity ball. It looked absolutely stupid, but that is what he did. It is just lazy and unprofessional. Just like when you go to a job interview and you wear a T-shirt, that usually does not give the right impression either. So does what we wear and hardly anyone at that level cares about some white on shoes as most of the time they do not sell shoes that are totally black anymore.

Peace

I worked in an area where even the highest level varsity officials wore belts: there was no local supplier (mid 2000s) who sold the beltless variety. When I asked the local sporting goods guy why he didn't sell them (a small isolated metro area of about 100,000), he said there wasn't enough market for them. Too many officials could go to Target or Sears and get a cheap pair of dress slacks for $15.

How good were these top officials?

How did you respond?

I've tried everything I can think of, including eBay. I'm not a size 6, unfortunately.

I am an old, old guy and one of the things that I am most sensitive about is the statement "he looks and calls like an old timey referee". So, I go to camp EVERY summer and try to adopt all the current philosophies deemed important by those clinicians. I try to stay current and that includes things like shirts, pants, shoes, whistles. I believe the more current your assignor the more closely you can emulate the TV guys, regardless of rule or officials manuals.