2019-2020 POE's
 

Coming to the end of the regular seasons here in Illinois. I was thinking about next year's POE's. Honestly, the number 1 thing I'd like to see has nothing to do directly with us on the court at all.

It seems like everyday I read a different article from a different newspaper in a different state about officials' shortages, and not just in basketball. I hear it every night in a different gym in a different community.

What I'd like to see from the NFHS is a directive to schools to patrol the bleachers better and really enforce that "sportsmanship code" or whatever gets read before the game.

I say this not because I'm thin-skinned and can't take the verbal abuse. If it bothered me I would have given it up years ago. I say it because 80% of new officials quit after two years because of the abuse. I say it because I read an article somewhere that last season there were 14 basketball officials in the state of Illinois age 30 or younger (I was 30 all of last basketball season). 14!!! From Chicago to Carbondale!

Something's got to change. Probably a pipe dream, but perhaps it would help retain more newer officials.

Its a problem without a solution, at least as far as the schools go. At best, the state orgs could start suspending problem schools from having home games, thus hurting them in the pocket book. But I don't see this fixing anything until we get out of this cycle.

In my head, the solution is rather easy. Practicality might be another story, but schools would need 2-4 people who aren't afraid of a little confrontation to patrol the crowd and get rid of poor sports. Maybe put that police presence to use and have the officer do it.

One fan ejection ought to send a message for the rest of the night.

Well, I can say this from personal experience. I am not sure that a number of people under 30 are all about a shortage of officials. In basketball in Illinois, we have actually about the same number of officials as we have had before in previous years. The numbers overall are down in raw numbers, but we are far from a shortage. I am not hearing of games not being covered. I am not hearing of times and dates to be changed. Maybe that is coming but not quite yet.

And as someone that teaches a new officials class in both basketball and has worked with the football class over the years as well, most newer officials are older and come into this when their kids get older and now they have time to officiate. I also think that this is about the economy as well. When the economy gets bad, people try to find other sources of income and often officiating is a good part-time job. The economy is a little better and those that got in when the economy crashed, now goes back to work or has more security and get out of officiating.

It must be also noted that if an official under 30 is any good, they can almost stop working high school basketball altogether and work college ball. I know guys that have 30 to 40 games in college and they hardly have any high school experience. Why would they work 100 high school games when they can make the same money working college ball with fewer headaches and time spent.

Now we need to do a better job as an officiating community to recruit officials at the younger ages. That is certainly the case. But part of the issue is that this is not appealing to those younger. I think a lot of younger people have no desire to put up with even being yelled at. I do not think that totally as to do with sportsmanship, I think that is just not a desire. Yes, sportsmanship is a problem and leading to all kinds of people to get out for sure. But I think even if you cleaned up some stuff, we still would have some that would never want to do this.

Peace

Light At End Of Tunnel ...
 

That's part of it. The other is in regard to upward mobility. Guys don't want to keep doing middle school, freshman, and junior varsity games year after year.

In many cases, it's warranted, they're not ready to move up, but in other cases it's politics, or observation/evaluation/rating/promotion procedures that may need some tweaking.

We revamped our observation/evaluation/rating/promotion procedures a few years ago and we're seeing more guys "stick it out". They can see a path to varsity games with fewer obstacles than in the past.

And in other cases it's because us older officials aren't ready to move out of the way. 70 is the new 50!

I would agree with your point, Billy. We had a great revamp of our observation program last year where all scores and comments for evals would be entered into Arbiter in addition to the observer coming into the locker room post game to discuss things with the crew. We could then see things that we need to improve on. It wasn't always perfect, as there were a few who would come into the room and say everything was great and then hammer guys on the eval. But by-and-large, it was great. I felt like I knew what I needed to improve on to get the games I wanted. This year, they've gone back to no feedback. I've been observed 3-4 times this year and have no idea what the observers scored me or things I still need to work on from their perspective. That is really frustrating because that is a great tool for both the assignors AND the officials.

We do have a shortage in Iowa of officials, so basically if you have a pulse and a desire, you can work varsity games. I've mentioned in the past about how we almost had to do some 2-man for small school ball in the very rural areas. But the guys who want to keep moving up to get (or continue to get) the fun big conference games and important playoff games have no idea where we stand and what to improve on.

In addition to that, we've received at least two emails from the assignor for the girls post season this year who has indicated that under almost no circumstances are we to call him because he is busy with his other job outside of high school athletics. We are only to email if it is imperative. That, alone, makes me understand why some guys would just say "to hell with it." He is the one the evals go to, he is the one making the decisions, but the language he used made it pretty clear that we are not a priority and should not expect him to do anything for us. So there is very little chance of us getting our eval scores or asking him for feedback on what to improve on to get better playoff games unless they plan to send those to us after the season. I can post the text of the email if anyone is curious, it seemed almost unprofessional to me.

yes please and thank you
 

hay Unigiantslayer....pls post that email and be sure REDACT the irrlevant parts of it. I'm sure it will be informative for all of us here on the Forum.

You make an important point. You’re observation is correct that while there have been well meaning people doing a handful of things to improve things there has been no improvement.

Publishing articles is fine but it’s hard to argue that they’ve changed things as there is no way to measure the effect they’ve had. There simply needs to be consequences for a fan that acts badly. Just getting kicked out of a game isn’t enough. I know of one school district whose policy is that if a fan gets kicked out of a game they will not be allowed to attend any school function for one year. They actually enforced it once on a grandparent who as a result of being kicked out of a game not only could not go to games but missed their grandchild’s graduation. But they haven’t had any problems since. Some form of this type of thing needs to be considered by every school district or perhaps even state associations.

The NFHS formed a Sports Medicine Advisory Committee to address concussions and injury situations. They need to form the NFHS Sportsmanship Advisory Committee to do the same thing with fan behavior. Rules education for fans and coaches, education of AD’s and school administrators on spotting and addressing problems and hiring only security personnel for games that have actual arresting authority are some other things to talk about.

Regarding the OP, I think the first think the NFHS should do is survey all officials to better understand the barriers to why officials stop officiating. Is it because they get tired of the abuse, is it because they get 100 JV games and no varsity, is it political, is it other circumstances such as family/job commitments, etc. Our association loses officials every year and gains some. The number one reason people stop being part of our association, they don't want to invest in the other parts of the organization like community service, training sessions, volunteering at team camp, donating to fundraisers, etc.

We need to take a hard look at the reasons, but if we don't understand the problem, it's hard to apply a solution. We all make assumptions, but a survey might help draw some places to focus on.

The big problem is that if everyone is going to get to full varsity schedules in 3-4 years or so, that implies they can only have them for for 1-2 years before they have to move out of the way for the next wave. The reality of the numbers is that a group will have to have some number of people that stay at JV a little longer, even if they could do varsity, just to keep enough people around to cover the games.

It is on my personal email so I don't have the exact text right this second but it went something very close to:
I will be traveling for work most of January and some of February for my day job and will not be able to take calls or answer texts/emails until after 3 or 4(?) each day.
went on to say something in that email very close to
I'll be working on post season assignments starting mid january so my nights will be filled and I will not have extra time to assist you in finding replacements out a week or two.

The next email sent this week said (paraphrased)

I might need help due to cancellations Friday, so if you can help send me a text. Only a text with your name and yes I can work, please do not send me emails, and definitely do not call me.

I don't know, maybe I read too much into it. But that doesn't exactly sound like someone who wants to chat with officials about their evals and/or questions about post season assignments and how they can get better. It is just frustrating because you have that, and anytime I've called the boys' association contact person (we have a Boys Association and a Girls Union in our state), he's also been very short and verging on rude to me about my pretty valid and simple questions. I can see why some guys would feel like the state doesn't support them, on top of dealing with the crap from fans/coaches on a nightly basis. I could go on and on with more examples but that has been the general consensus from every official who has brought this stuff up this season.

How is the NF going to at all set a standard for different jurisdictions, with different values and different security and fan interaction? The NF can put out whatever they would like, but that does not mean some school district is going to follow those standards if the state or the state athletic high school association does not set or enforce such positions. Even if an official is assaulted or harassed, there are no NF laws that can prosecute those violators.

Sportsmanship is a problem, but not sure how the NF putting something on a book or on a website is going to change that problem if we at the local level do not take action. Heck officials in some cases will not give back games if they think it will hurt their career when certain schools have been constant violators.

Peace

I've worked for supervisors who say never to call them unless it's an emergency situation. I've worked for supervisors who say never to text them, only email them. I've worked for supervisors who have said never to ask them about your schedule or why you are or aren't getting games. I've worked for supervisors who contact you before putting you into a last minute assignment and others who expect you take an assignment the morning of if you are not blocked out.

It's all part of the business to navigate the nuances, quirks, and personalities of those who assign us games.

Perhaps limiting the amount of varsity games an official can work per week can have a positive effect on sportsmanship and "new" official retention. This of course would only be possible where there are enough officials to cover games. Local governing bodies can decide. I have a problem with officials working 4-5 nights per week and new guys (with potential) are not advancing. I limit my nights to 3 per week and I think that is plenty.

Definitely. I don't have a huge problem with it, as this is a hobby for me as well and I have no problem telling an assignor I won't work a game because I want to be with my family or am swamped at work. I get it. But at the end of the day, we're losing people and I know a lot of guys are pretty dismayed at the lack of feedback that we've received this year. It's hard to get better by only watching yourself on film and not getting any help from the people who actually assign the games on what they would want to see out of you.

How would limiting how much independent contractors can work fix sportsmanship?

You're free to limit how many nights you want to work, and other officials are allowed to work 7 nights/week if that's what they want and can get. Officiating is a capitalistic business.

(In South Carolina the state office books all varsity assignments and we are limited to 2/week, but 95% of games here are on Tuesdays and Fridays so it doesn't really matter.)

My logic is that it will help combat the ol' "you will never work here again" attitude if officials are more strict with coaches and players. If an official is worried about not getting games because he addresses poor sportsmanship, then he is probably wants to be working 4-5 nights per week. When coaches are allowed to say and do whatever they want on the sideline, it pours into the crowd and onto the floor.

OK???

How is that going to prevent that? I do not work in a system where a coach has much say over who works their games. They might complain to their conference assignor, but they have no say over tournaments, non-conference games or showcases that take place.

And if they say something like that to you, T them up or ignore them. Who cares what a coach says to you when they do not control such an event anyway?

Peace

I don't have an assignor. Neither do many of my peers. It is possible to make the wrong coach upset and not get contracts. I think even having the perception that this can happen will deter a brown nosing official from addressing bad behavior. This is not a one size fits all solution. Even if it is a possible solution. It is clear that there are shortages of officials in some areas partly due to poor sportsmanship. Whatever is going on in these areas is not working and a change is due.

Don't worry, pretty soon you'll be seeing more older, lower level college officials doing more HS games as NCAA Men's is in a full court press to get rid of older officials. As these older officials start working fewer Power 6 conference games and more mid-major and D2 games, it will start pushing other older officials below them either out of officiating or back down the ladder.

I got my first D3 contract at 44, D1 at 45, and D2 at 50. That's not going to be happening anymore.

Well, I do. Most of Illinois does at this time. And this is not an issue with many conferences. I know assignors that might not put officials in bad situations on purpose. But I know assignors that are not preventing certain officials to go to certain schools. And in those places that have assignors, that does not solve this issue you suggested it would. And I do not know how the NF controls any of that at all. The NF does not assign anything in states.

Actually, I think there are more issues related to a shortage. They found that out when they asked officials in our state that there were other issues.

Peace

I am not a phone person. I am an email person. I have in my email signature "Phone for emergencies only. Email will typically get a quicker response."

And yet people call. During my current ice storm, the only emergencies I have are filling games on Saturday and Monday (which are very popular right now) -- and yet I had someone call about a track officiating date in 2020. I work a day job, too. I have other things to take care of. People just don't get it. Or think that anything involving them is an emergency.

Unless I recognize the number, it rolls to voice mail these days. I answer, usually by email, when I can.

That is the key to all of this. I worked with someone last night that claimed he was upset with an assignor because he was getting off a lower level game to work a varsity game. He was complaining that the assignor wanted him to find a replacement for his he was getting off the sophomore game for and said the assignor should find a replacement for the game on his own. Well, that is not likely to help that official in the long run and he is not someone that is a necessity to that assignor (not a state final guy or a sectional guy in the playoffs). Clearly, this is one of those things that with the right person, might put you at the bottom of the list if you cannot handle their requests. This guy thought he was in the right (and still does) but I told him that this particular assignor is likely old school and feels that is the way you should do when you are moving up. The official felt that because we use Arbiter, we should not have to do that in any way.

The bottom line, there really is no right or wrong on what should be done, except the assignor sets the parameters. And if you want to continue to work for them, you likely are going to have to follow their little rules or standards.

Peace

Last season a D3 supervisor called me at 11:00pm at night to work a game for him the next evening, when I already had a JuCo game scheduled for another assignor. He said b/c his was a higher level game he expected me to take his game.

I couldn't get in touch with my JuCo assignor until the next morning, and he told me would release me but I needed to find a replacement. Luckily one of my HS assignors worked with me in 2 college conferences (including the JuCo) and he released one his officials (also in the JuCo conference) from a HS game to fill in for me.

Expectations and relationships drove that whole situation.

Interesting...what would have happened if your JuCo assigner decided to be stubborn and not release or you couldn't find a replacement? Seems like a no-win situation for you.

Were you blocked on the D3 assigner's calendar? I've been called before and asked "Why are you blocked?" for a certain day where an assigner needs someone. Pisses me off because it's not really an assigner's business why my schedule is blocked. Call someone that's open.

And I know D3 is considered a higher level than JuCo, but having officiated both I didn't really notice any difference in the levels of play. The pay was the biggest difference but even that wasn't hugely significant.

I rarely block out a higher level supervisor when I have a lower level game. And in this case, the D3 game was 9 miles from my house, which is the primary reason he called on me.

D3 teams are a lot more disciplined and the basketball is better, though JuCo teams may have athletes that are just as good or better than D3 teams. There is a reason those players are in JuCo. I'll take a D3 game over a JuCo game 7 days/week.

Fortunately I didn't have to find out. The JuCo supervisor was a multi-conference D1 official when he was on the floor, so he was understanding of my plight. Unfortunately he lost the JuCo this season, but he still has a D2 conference, but none of those schools are in reasonable driving distance for me.

That's When I Beat My Wife ...
 

"That's when I buy my crack cocaine."

"That's when I call my college basketball bets into my bookie."

"That's when I throw my single use plastic bags into the ocean, and watch the sea turtles eat them."

Probably better to say a nicer version of, "That's none of your damn business".

Actually, all of my college supervisors say it is none of their business why we have a date blocked. I've only ever received complaints about blocked out dates from HS supervisors.

I've only once ever had a college supervisor ask me why I was blocked. He lost one of his officials the morning of a noon tip-off. That official was told he needed to be on stand-by at a D1 school (a game he ended up working for $1900). My supervisor luckily had a DH at his venue, so he moved one of the 2:00 officials up to the 12:00 game. He then got hold of an official who was flying back from a G-League assignment who landed and immediately drove 90 minutes and got to the arena about 20 minutes before the 2:00 game tipped off.

The registered list might say the numbers are the same but its a HUGE problem down here. We lose people everyday..and can't really recruit...We have 5 or 10 retire every year and I might see two or three new faces.
BAS point is something that bothers me. Schools know who their idiots are...they could control them..However, those idiots might be parents voters etc. Administrators at games want to sit and watch. do nothing more...

The numbers are not exactly the same, but that being said different things can be different depending on the area. When I was in central Illinois, we worked two games on a varsity night for mostly the small schools. The bigger schools never did that or it was not common practice.

And I still do not think that is all about sportsmanship. Pay, not working in certain places (or the politics) and even expenses factor into this IMO as well. We have had issues for some time in officiating across sports and it is not always because coaches, fans or players can be stupid.

Peace