Someone might have already mentioned this but what do you do with the fool wearing the number 78? You can't make a 7 with one hand, unless we use sign language or something. :D

In Fed games, they're illegal. In rec, who cares whether you use one hand or two? The scorekeeper is too busy fixing her daughter's ponytail, anyway.

I'll jump in here

I would like to see 2 hands but that also means that we need to be able to report on the move instead of going to the reporting box. I feel that the once the game has been interrupted the ball needs to get back into play faster... 2 habd speeds things up a hair, so does reporting while moving, but NF needs to look at other things as well.

The NBA has great scorekeepers who do it well, that is not the case in high school and so we get saddled with stuff because we attempt to communicate with a less trained bunc...The reason that many of the things we do as officials is because someone thinks that scorekeepers at the high school level are not the sharpest bunch. or that officials are not the sharpest tacks ether(sometimes they are right) What we have is still a lot of tradition thst maintains interruptions....

1) eliminating the switch when the foul is called in the backcourt...(eliminate the long switch)

2) stop putting the ball in on the baeline and adopt the NBA go to the sideline.. ( works well woth # 1)

3) take out all the preliminary signal junk unless the call needs to be sold

There are other things that are just plain annoying...
4) stop making us raise our open hand on evey violation, we know it does not stop the clock.

5) why do we have an open hand raised when the ball is coming in?

Gee, Kelvin, don't hold back so. It's bad for your heart. Go ahead. Let it all out. Tell us how you really feel.

Yeah, but you always end up with the kid with the taped number on the back or the kid with his brother's friend's nephew's soccer jersey because he left his at home...

I have never had a number on the jersey that included a 6,7,8,or 9, in a HS game, although I've recently had a summer league game where a kid was #101.

This could be a good thing in a running clock game.

"Blue, O-o-n-n-n-e-e h-h-h-u-u-n-d-d-r-r-r-e-e-e-d-d , a-a-a-n-n-d- , o-o-n-n-n-e-e. Push. Got that, table? O-o-n-n-n-e-e h-h-h-u-u-n-d-d-r-r-r-e-e-e-d-d , a-a-a-n-n-d- , o-o-n-n-n-e-e..."

Even someone as out of shape as me would have no trouble in a game like that!

Who is this kelvin green guy. You are my new best friend. You just said everything that I wanted to say, but I have been trying to take a back seat approach to this forum and just listen and learn.

By the way in my assosciation we have eliminated the long swithch.

KELVIN YOU ARE THE MAN!!!!

The question remains...what would you do? They still get to play with an illegal number...just at the cost of a T. So, the moment they check in, you're going to be reporting a foul on #78 (by the book).

I could go with #1 and #2 without any question.

#3 does server to communicate a little more to your partners...I could give it up without a fuss.

#4...it does tell your partner what class of infraction you have....good for double whistles.

#5. Gotta make some signal for the timer to start the clock. The hand up that falls at the first touch give the timer something clear to focus on rather than a hand that flashes up and down in a moment. Since there must be a signal to start the clock, do you have a better one?

Well, since it can't be done with one hand either, it's not really a valid question...

If you believe that the normal average timer is watching for the hand to chop instead of when THEY see the ball touched to start the clock, I guess you believe in the easter bunny too. :) Reality is, regardless of what they are told before the game, the timer works the clock on whne s/he perceives the ball is touched. Maybe that is why at the progressive upper levels (NBA,WNBA,NCAA women) the hand is not up on the throw-in. There is a count and a chop of some kind with the same hand when it is touched, not that the chop is looked at during these games either

bigwhistle, you are partially right. In the upper level games the officials start the clock with precision time and stop the clock with the whistle. That is one reason they don't have the hand up but you are right, they aren't looking at us anyway.

I worked multiple AAU games at a tourney last weekend. There were 4 courts going at once, side by side, with no partitions. The games were 17U - 13U boys, all with noisy and enthusiastic (yeah right) parents and coaches.

These are not the usual circumstances for a college or pro ref, or even most HS refs. However, in this situation, with many whistles and continuous noise, my partner's "hand up" was very helpful in determining if it was actually HIS whistle. The most communication difficulty I had was with a partner who did not stop clock with hand up (nor did he make eye contact). Not a college ref, but a lazy HS one.

Sure it can. Give the sign language signal for #7, and then for #8. Each of those only takes one hand.