Officiating Post COVID-19 ???

[BillyMac]

I answered an online survey yesterday (I believe it was from NASO) about safety concerns in officiating next season. Some questions dealt with wearing masks while officiating. So I was thinking how that's fine for officials that don't use whistles (baseball, softball, gymnastics, etc.) but how is that relevant to me officiating basketball?

Today I got an email advertisement from the company that provides our IAABO uniforms:



Fox 40 Electronic Whistle

Should I purchase one now to avoid another "toilet paper situation"?

[BillyMac]

NASO’s 13-Point Plan: Getting Back To Officiating Sensibly

Much has been written and aired about organized sports reorganizing themselves such that games can again be played. When sports reignite, what will be expected of us? At the barest minimum and for your personal safety, strictly adhering to CDC guidelines, OHSA guidelines where applicable and others which have been adopted by the communities in which we intend to officiate. Err on the side of safety!

Take a common-sense approach to the restart of your officiating. It could well be that you will be inundated with requests for your services. This will be the result of the pent-up demand to get organized contests once again being held. Those contests could well be played with no fans. But it is safe to say that those who own the games, who govern the games, are not contemplating holding their games with no sports officials. If games are to be played, we will be needed to referee those games.

The common-sense approach I mentioned above has these components:

1. NASO advocates in the strongest of terms that an organization/association intending to relaunch its games pay special attention to the needs of the officials it will so desperately need. It should adopt and publicize provisions designed to enhance the safety and wellbeing of the officials.

2. Those staging the games should make sure the playing area has been properly cleaned and organized in a way that the officials are not also turned into virus maintenance workers. The officials will already be saddled with the extra burden of enforcing new playing rules and variations in game management to ensure safety of participants.

3. Officials must be provided an equally safe working environment as is provided for the players, coaches, fans and site management personnel.

4. The rules of the upcoming games may be adjusted by the rules-makers. NASO urges that any adoptions made in regard to the Covid-19 landscape be done in a way that gives strong consideration to the officiating role in the application and enforcement of those adoptions.

5. If you are an amateur official you are an independent-contractor and thus, do not have to take any assignment which will make you uncomfortable from the standpoint of your personal health. If you choose to not take an assignment, turn it down respectfully. Don’t preach. Just state your beliefs and move on. This choice is yours. Yes, there could be some negative fallout from an assignor. But since the choice is yours, just accept that potential downside. Your health comes first.

6. If you serve as an assignor, please show forbearance toward any official who decides to not accept one of your assignments because of health concerns. Your thoughtfulness will make things better.

7. If you are feeling sick or are experiencing even a low-grade fever, don’t go out and officiate. Stay home and find out what the problem is. Do not do something that could cause harm or impose a health risk to someone else.

8. Pay special attention to your personal hygiene. Wash your hands. Make sure hand sanitizer is available for your use. Minimize touching your eyes, nose and mouth.

9. Get a mask and use the mask. When in doubt about wearing a mask, wear one. If the assignment you are fulfilling has a requirement for mask usage, embrace that and wear the mask. Explore ahead of time ways your decisions can be heard while working with a mask: electronic whistles, air-whistles, horns, etc.

10. There will be times when wearing a mask simply is not reasonable in your mind. In those cases, you have a decision to make: work with no mask and accept the inherent risk or choose to not work. Know before you go what will be expected of you in this regard.

11. Be vigilant about social distancing (6-feet), which will take concentration during the time you are at a game site: before, during and after. Do your very best to keep your distance protected. This protocol will be challenging of course. There are going to be times when proper social distancing gets violated. Minimize those incursions. Learn to physically keep yourself at as safe a distance as you reasonably can. Stay away from handshakes, until those are greenlighted by the health professionals. Plan ahead.

12. When instant Covid-19 testing becomes easily or widely available, stop what you are doing and go get tested and retested as your situation warrants.

13. When a Covid-19 vaccination becomes easily or widely available, stop what you are doing and get vaccinated.

Do these things and you can feel much more confident in taking the floor, field, pitch and diamond…and aren’t we itching to do just that! We need the games. Our culture needs the games. The games need us. Let’s help make that happen but only with a commitment to the safety of all concerned: the officials, the players, the coaches and the fans, if they happen to be in evidence.

Barry Mano
President, NASO

[LRZ]

If I need a mask and an electronic whistle, I'm not officiating. No, thanks all the same.

[ChuckS]

Surprised in number 10 he does not know the purpose of a mask.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

13. When a Covid-19 vaccination becomes easily or widely available, stop what you are doing and get vaccinated.

Heh...does jumping to take the first vaccination that becomes available satisfy NASO's common sense?

There's talk of rushing this vaccine out. Not a good idea with any drug, let alone a biological, and especially as a prophylactic!

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by ChuckS

Surprised in number 10 he does not know the purpose of a mask.

I believe that he does. The "inherent risk" is that he may infect others, including some others that may be in a high risk category (like me).

I realize that while it isn't the main purpose of wearing a mask (it's to prevent infecting others), when I venture out of my isolated bomb shelter to hunt and gather food while wearing a mask, I feel that the mask prevents me from touching my face (mouth, nose), so there may be some selfish, small, personal health benefit to me wearing a mask before I head back down to hide in my bomb shelter for another week.

[SC Official]

Interesting how all the virus/social distancing virtue-signaling from the media has ceased in the wake of these protests. It’s almost as though it was, at minimum, overblown from the start. I see no reason why we can’t go back to normal including having basketball this winter. If someone chooses not to officiate, that is their prerogative I fully support.

(And before someone gets mad, I support the peaceful protests. Just think the irony is funny.)

[Kansas Ref]

I look fwd to officiating this summer for youth tournaments and during the regular season for local high schools.
I have seen/heard the electronic handheld whistle during a game last season wherein one of my partners could not blow a regular whistle because of dental jaw bone degradations and irritations he told me. So, he used the ewhistle (see picture in previous post to this thread); however, the sound quality of that ewhistle was poor. It sounded like a faintly elevating "chirrrpp chirrpp". I recall that I had to step in and also blow my normal whistle when the players kept on playing instead of stopping play at the whistle.
Alas, I'm certain we will "figure-it-out" as the situation demands tho.

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Interesting how all the virus/social distancing virtue-signaling from the media has ceased in the wake of these protests.

What's the more important and urgent story right now? The pandemic, which may have plateaued leading many states to consider careful reopenings (we can finally get haircuts starting today in Connecticut), or to the civil rights protests (and/or riots) which are the worst I've seen since the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968?

While the "original sin" of the 400 year old plight of African Americans is a really big story (and should continue to be, even as the protests and/or riots calm down), so are the 100,000 American deaths caused by an infectious disease, a disease that we were ill prepared to deal with, and where we may have made some mistakes in dealing with it in its early stages.

What's the bigger story? Police precinct stations going up in flames and Target stores being looted, or hundreds of people not wearing masks and not social distancing while relaxing in a swimming pool drinking adult beverages while the commander-in-chief, and many others, enjoy a couple of rounds of golf with no flagsticks, no sand trap rakes, no nineteenth hole appletinis, and pool noodles in the holes?

Also, compare the "reopen" protesters to the civil rights protesters. Not many peaceful, long gun carrying "reopen" protesters wore face masks, while many civil rights protesters (and/or rioters) are wearing face masks, as are most of the media covering the protests.

This pandemic is not over, and may not be over until there is a vaccine. We still have to be aware and be careful, or it may come back, and if it comes back during the next influenza season, especially if it's a particularly bad flu season, we're really going to be in for a really big problem. Hopefully, we may be better prepared deal with a combined "second wave"/bad flu season, we already have our masks, and our hand sanitizer.

Watch the civil rights protests (and/or riots) on television, or participate in the protests (hopefully peacefully), if you want, but keep washing your hands, wear your face mask (to protect others, especially others at high risk, like me), and if anybody gets within six feet of you start a five second count.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Interesting how all the virus/social distancing virtue-signaling from the media has ceased in the wake of these protests. It’s almost as though it was, at minimum, overblown from the start. I see no reason why we can’t go back to normal including having basketball this winter. If someone chooses not to officiate, that is their prerogative I fully support.

(And before someone gets mad, I support the peaceful protests. Just think the irony is funny.)

Well, my wife is a medical field worker, nothing has changed in that situation and she works in a major city (where there were mass protests all over the city and suburbs) that I think we will still see influences from this virus based on what is done or not done by youth and pro leagues in the coming weeks. I just had two camps completely canceled that were postponed a few months ago in the last 48 hours. One was originally scheduled for the end of June, the other was from April but looking for a date in July. The school and the shoe company were scrapping their events for I am sure safety reasons and probably a complete lack of commitment from the participants. If schools are still out and kids are not having any school activity now, then it is probably not going to be advantageous for teams to travel to a place that was near the hotbed of a virus outbreak. Also, are travel teams going to take the risk as well?

As a football official, that is what seems to be driving what happens with schools. Right now there is no activity in high school with any sports as there would be basically starting today. So if schools are still in jeopardy of starting, that will influence the fall seasons and then might run into the winter season. So I am not so sure that everything will be back to normal if schools all over the country are not finding a good path to come back in the same form they normally do.

The media covering protests and riots across the country has not changed those facts of what the threat might be. I guess we will see if pro sports even can come back because that is really what started this entire situation in the first place.

Peace

[Raymond]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Interesting how all the virus/social distancing virtue-signaling from the media has ceased in the wake of these protests. It’s almost as though it was, at minimum, overblown from the start. I see no reason why we can’t go back to normal including having basketball this winter. If someone chooses not to officiate, that is their prerogative I fully support.

(And before someone gets mad, I support the peaceful protests. Just think the irony is funny.)

I've seen plenty of mention of how the protests and Covid-19 safety protocols do not mix well and we may well be seeing new outbreaks because of this. I guess we're watching and listening to different media sources.

I plan on visiting my father's for Father's Day, so I'll be getting tested and self-quarantining the week before I go b/c I can't afford to be asymptomatic and give my diabetic and cancer surviving father the virus.

My local assignor sent out a feeler about working at the local AAU venue starting in July. I told him I don't trust that they will keep the facility sanitized to Covid-19 safety standards. Said if I were to work, I would be arriving dressed 10 or 15 minutes before game time, working two straight games, then immediately leaving.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

As a football official ...

Here in Connecticut we're starting to think about fall interscholastic sports. While some fall sports may be easy to socially distance (cross country), others like football, with twenty-two players within several yards of each other at the line of scrimmage, may be more difficult to socially distance. One serious suggestion we've heard here in Connecticut is to switch baseball and football seasons. Have baseball, an easy sport for social distancing, this coming fall, and have football in the spring of 2021 when we may have a vaccine.

Football goes with tulips and daffodils? Right?

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Also, compare the "reopen" protesters to the civil rights protesters. Not many peaceful, long gun carrying "reopen" protesters wore face masks, while many civil rights protesters (and/or rioters) are wearing face masks, as are most of the media covering the protests.

Not many of the "reopen" protesters were setting fire to their cities and destroying businesses and their owners' (who had nothing to do with the incident) lives, either.

See, I can cherrypick, too.

Also, if you do your research you can clearly see how the importance of masks (especially porous cloth ones) is overstated and in many cases simply used as a political statement. I went to the doctor this morning and wore a mask because I assumed that was the expectation - not a single soul in the office had a mask on. Touching your mask and putting it back on all day long would seem to defeat the purpose according to common sense.

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Raymond

I've seen plenty of mention of how the protests and Covid-19 safety protocols do not mix well and we may well be seeing new outbreaks because of this. I guess we're watching and listening to different media sources.

I plan on visiting my father's for Father's Day, so I'll be getting tested and self-quarantining the week before I go b/c I can't afford to be asymptomatic and give my diabetic and cancer surviving father the virus.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

We must be, because all the doomsdayers I heard lecture us with the "if it saves even one life" nonsense don't seem to care anymore about social distancing.

You are free to choose how to live your life, and I respect you for considering your father. Not going to hear me tell you otherwise.

[SNIPERBBB]

Basketball probably isn't the sport officiate in if you're have a more than average worry about getting sick. We just came off the worst flu season probably since I was in highschool sophomore year and that was 20 years ago. Every other school was being closed because of student absences to flu, won't be surprised if some of those get relabeled covid cases of they get antibody tested.

I'll be out there this winter. Might not be as many grandparents in the stands or calling games though.