I am new to this forum, so this topic may have been discussed already, but I would still enjoy the opinions of others.

A 2nd year official is paired with a veteran. In a tight game situation, the new official is the lead official on the baseline and the veteran is out on top. There is a quick change of posession and the new offical beats the veteran across mid court and there is nobody to cover the area under the basket for the lay-in. How would you handle this situation if you were the young official?

You mean the rookie went from old lead to new lead, leaving the vet at midcourt to go from old trail to new trail?

If I were the young official I would tell that old fart to move his butt down court faster next time! :p

If I were the old fa...err...the veteran I would tell the rookie to relax, I got it covered, wisdom & grace beats inexperience & youthful exhuberance every time! :) (Right JR?)

Anyways...if I read this right the rookie made a typical rookie mistake. Hopefully it won't happen again.

No, I should have been more clear. The rookie never went to the new lead position. He stopped in the trail spot and left the area under the basket with no coverage until the veteran got down court. But, by that time the ball was already headed back the other way after a blatant foul by the defender, that couldn't be called because there was no official there to call it.

IF you are one of the officials in this sitch.....

If you saw a BLATANT foul by the defender then that means that YOU could (and should) have called it regardless of your T positioning.



[Edited by Robmoz on Oct 27th, 2004 at 03:14 PM]

I would turn and run back down the court and cover my area as lead again. IOW, I cover my area and let my partner cover his area.

Let's face it, you're in a tough spot. It gets even tougher when you're shooting the bull with him at half-time and he's complaining about never getting good games and how political it can get. You're thinking, "Yea, you can't run more than a mile and a half per hour, and they don't move you up because you're not good buddies with the assignor? Okay, fine...."

The best thing to do is just lay back and let him fall flat by himself. You could try asking the assignor a hypothetical question such as you asked here, and let him ask you who it was, or let him figure it out for himself. What isn't going to happen is you're not going to get credit for correcting him or tattling, if you try it. That path is equivalent to shooting yourself in the foot. If a coach complains to you, here's a sentence that is pretty neutral, but gets the message across. "Coach, I've got my hands full back here with 6 players. He's got lots of experience, I expect he knows how to get the best angle on the play." Hopefully, the coach realizes that he can accomplish more than you can with a complaint to the assignor.

To answer your question
 

I would come down a bit further than the initial trail position and give my co-official a chance to get there. I have even gone almost to the end line. Just to make sure I could see the play.

Its not just slow people. Sometimes, an official gets caught on the sideline and cannot get past players to get down to the new lead. This is when a good pregame helps. Also, if you have the wheels to get there and can have good communucation with your co-offical, I see no reason to switch.

Of course, I doubt you are going to have good pregame with someone that can't get down the floor.