Reaching out of your area

[ilyazhito]

For me personally, every game is relevant for promotion, even if nobody is watching. This is because every game is an opportunity to work on good habits, judgement, communication, signals, or something else. This way, when I have a game when a paid evaluator does show up (or a subvarsity game when the varsity officials evaluate me and send ratings to the people responsible for evaluations and promotions), I already have a good base to work with. From then on, it is more about refining the little things and fine-tuning decisions than any major overhaul of mechanics,etc. This was why I was annoyed about my "veteran" partner, although I did not say anything to him (I know it was CYO games, and he would have blown me off if I had expressed my concerns) about reaching. Working the subvarsity games I had yesterday, though, was night and day because I had varsity officials as my partners.

In Board 12, officials have at least a minimal pregame conference for rec games about covering one's own area, league rule differences, and frequency of switching. Same thing usually applies to rec games I have with other organizations. Of course, MS and high school games have a more structured pregame conference format.

I try my darnedest to not reach in another official's primary area on calls, but if there is a double whistle, I will yield to the primary official. Only if there is no call on an obvious play, and I have waited for the other official to make a call (after his normal decision-making window ends), then will I make a call out of my primary area. I may call a foul outside my primary under those criteria, but I would not call a violation (travel, illegal dribble, etc.) outside my primary area, unless it involves a closely guarded count on a player leaving my area of coverage.