Ratings

Coachdg · #1 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:14am

Just looking for some quick opinions. Do you think a rating system that involves a peer rating along with coaches ratings work? Can you give me examples that work and don't work. Thanks

Jurassic Referee · #2 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:26am

Quote:

Originally posted by Coachdg
Just looking for some quick opinions. Do you think a rating system that involves a peer rating along with coaches ratings work? Can you give me examples that work and don't work. Thanks

Coach, what are your qualifications to rate officials? Do you know what mechanics we're supposed to be using? Do you know all of the rules and their different nuances? Are you aware of current POE's?

Jmo, but most coaches are about as qualified to rate officials as officials are to rate coaches.

zebraman · #3 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:29am

Quote:

Originally posted by Coachdg
Just looking for some quick opinions. Do you think a rating system that involves a peer rating along with coaches ratings work? Can you give me examples that work and don't work. Thanks

There are no perfect ratings systems. Refs that are rated high will generally feel fairly positive about a ratings system and refs that are rated lower will think that it sucks and is political.

I have seen several ratings systems in my short career and all of them have "worked" in that they generally do a fairly good job of ordering officials from top to bottom.

In my experience, a peer system works best. A system with independent evaluators sounds great, but finding qualified evaluators with time to see each official several times is almost impossible. Coaches seem to rate too much on "I remember when that official made a tough call and cost me a game" and sometimes punish great officials with their bias. Just my 2 cents.

Z

jritchie · #4 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:31am

but still, coaches are let rate officials here in kentucky and they give them 80% out of 100%, to decide who goes to do district, region, and state games! Top 25 get districts top 12 get regions, and if you are in the top 3 you have a chance to be asked by the state assignor to go do the state tourney, but if your coaches in your region feel negative against you because you t'd them up last week, you may not make it to either tourney!!!! has to be a better way!!

Coachdg · #5 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:34am

Don't be thrown by the username, I have been a baseball umpire in NY for over 20 years, and a basketball official for the past 5, I did coach and I agree that most coaches are not qualified to rate officials. We have some members of our board that are opposed to peer ratings, there seems to be a trust issue, they are afraid of cronyism.

Jurassic Referee · #6 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:41am

Quote:

Originally posted by Coachdg
Don't be thrown by the username, I have been a baseball umpire in NY for over 20 years, and a basketball official for the past 5, I did coach and I agree that most coaches are not qualified to rate officials. We have some members of our board that are opposed to peer ratings, there seems to be a trust issue, they are afraid of cronyism.

Cronyism could be a valid concern when it comes to internal peer ratings. So could an official maybe worrying about a young gun(s) coming up to take over his spot. That's why ratings should be done by trained evaluators who have no agenda or axe to grind. If you don't do it that way, you'll never know if everyone was using the same criteria to rate- which is key.

JRutledge · #7 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 11:45am

Quote:

Originally posted by Coachdg
Just looking for some quick opinions. Do you think a rating system that involves a peer rating along with coaches ratings work? Can you give me examples that work and don't work. Thanks

My state has a system where coaches' ratings and officialÂ’s ratings (certified officials only) are in place. I really do not think it matters. No matter what system we live under, someone is going to be upset with that system. We have what is called a power rating. The power rating consists of 5 points for each area considered. We get points for our promotion level (X-R-C), Part 1 Exam, previous tournament experience, all ratings by percentile, number of varsity games, and finally top 15 list percentile.

The IHSA office also considers attending a certified clinic (for basketball that means a 6 hour clinic), must attend a rules meeting during the current year, officials availability, geographic consideration of the officials, and current promotion level of official. Certified officials get the assignments first and other level of officials will be considered secondary.

Some people do not like it, others are OK with it. I personally am neutral on the issue. To me the current system is better than what it used to be. Before coaches used to go to a seeding meeting and just give 25 names of officials that they wanted to see in the post season. Supposedly the IHSA office would take those names and assign playoffs to people that were put on these lists. Of course we never knew who was listed or not as official. If you had a coach as a friend you might get some incite on who would be listed, but it was always not official information. Our ratings are listed on our personal websites and we know where we are rated as it relates to the entire state. These ratings are updated weekly so we know what happens. Before our current process, the officials were totally in the dark and we would never know why we got a playoff game or why we did not. Now we have some harder information to go by. It is not at all perfect and I personally wish there was an observers program to determine a separation between the good officials from the great officials. Our state does observe officials often, but it is only a couple of people that do this on a regular basis (at least that we are aware of) and they are primarily looking at officials that might be eligible for state final consideration (Sectional level officials and higher). For an official that has not worked a sectional level game, you have to be in the same building of a official being considered for a state final and hope they saw enough to give you a chance to work the post season. If your numbers are not very high, then it is unlikely that you will be considered for the playoffs if you are not observed.

Peace

icallfouls · #8 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 12:10pm

This has been a very serious topic in our area the past couple of years.

I agree with what has been said to this point. Most coaches don't know the mechanics of officiating and how a crew is supposed to work, what official has what responsibilities in different situations.

I also agree that coaches should have some input into a ratings system. Afterall, we are providing a service to the schools that hire us, but that input should be limited to things like how an official interacts during a game. Is the conduct professional? Did the official communicate when NECESSARY and as the game allowed, not to be confused with a question like "How could your partner miss that?" A coach can evaluate things like the ability of the referee to keep up. Although a tough criteria to evaluate, did the official have control of the game?

The biggest issue for coaches that I see, is how objective can they be when they are more affected by the result of each call. Jobs are on the line, depending on the level you coach at. Most coaches still pay more attention to what is happening near the ball, but officials must see on-ball and off-ball. Do you have a personal relationship with any official? If so, can you really be objective in their evaluation? Coaches really don't understand the concept that contact is not necessarily a foul. These are things that limit the effectiveness of using coaches in a rating system, but there is a place for them.

I know alot of people will have different thoughts on this. I wonder how coaches would feel if the officials were to evaluate coaches on their performance. Its seems like alot of coaches have never lost a game because of something they did (like got T'd or put the star back in the game with four fouls too early) or didn't do (go to a man-to-man), it was either a "player didn't get it done" or a "ref screwed me."

So many thoughts, so little time

JRutledge · #9 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 12:28pm

Here is some information about the IHSA process.

IHSA Assigning Process

In this link, there is some current information about what losing coaches and winning coaches rated officials. The percentage differences are only a few tenths of a percentage point. Coaches also have to answer a few questions before the ratings go through. They have to answer if a call affected their rating or opinion of the official. I think a copy of the ratings form is on this link.

Peace

Coachdg · #10 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 01:06pm

JRutledge, Thanks very much for your input, the download will be quite helpful. I am a member of a committee put together by our executive board that is being asked to come up with a new rating system. So I appreciate all of your opinions.

tjones1 · #11 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 02:34pm

In IL, if you are rated a 5 (bad) by a coach then she/he must explain why they rated you poorly. However, most of the time if the coach feels they got the shaft they will just rate a 4 and not have to explain anything. What I don't understand is, if both 4 and 5 are considered "non-varsity" officials, why don't coaches have to explain a 4 rating as well at the varsity level. JRut, any help?

JRutledge · #12 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 02:49pm

Quote:

Originally posted by tjones1
In IL, if you are rated a 5 (bad) by a coach then she/he must explain why they rated you poorly. However, most of the time if the coach feels they got the shaft they will just rate a 4 and not have to explain anything. What I don't understand is, if both 4 and 5 are considered "non-varsity" officials, why don't coaches have to explain a 4 rating as well at the varsity level. JRut, any help?

You need to ask the people that created the system. I have no idea why that is.

Also understand that the ratings are for varsity contests only. These ratings are not for lower level games. Maybe that is a reason for the explanation.

Peace

tjones1 · #13 (**permalink**) Fri Oct 07, 2005, 02:55pm

I stand corrected. My fault, a 4 rating is defined as the following: "4 = Qualified to work varsity contests." For some reason I thought differently. Sorry

brandan89 · #14 (**permalink**) Sat Oct 08, 2005, 12:22am

Here in Louisiana, at ever varsity game we have to give each coach a rating card for him/her to fill out and send back to our assignor. The rating cards somewhat determine if you get play-off games and what not, but he takes in consideration some coaches are just jerks. Also, I would say about 75% of the time they cards wind up on the floor or garbage at the school and never make it back.

Take a look at it:
http://www.lhsaa.org/officials/forms...atingCard.pdf.

[Edited by brandan89 on Oct 8th, 2005 at 01:25 AM]