Actually, I swung my arms 5 times and when it came back to my chest to go out for 6, is when I checked for violation. Also, keep in mind that I'm not just standing right there looking at the thrower. I'm also watching for illegal contact by the defense, illegal screens that are right in front of me.

I don't know if I agree that your arm count takes presidence. My count is always in my head, and the reason is such. I give the ball to the thrower-in, and I accidently drop my whistle. I got one arm up to hold the clock, and the other arm needs to retrieve the whistle and put it back in my mouth, during this time, the count remains in my head even though I may have missed a couple of seconds with my arm movement and consequently only show 3 arm movements for the violation. In counting 10 seconds, sometimes I forget to start the count, and start my count at 2 or 3, however much time I think has elapse from the time the ball was put in play to now. I sync my cadence with the clock, really useful with a shot clock because if I'm at 5, and the shot clock shows 30, I know I'm in sync with the time cadence.

I would tend to agree with NR. Your count and arm swings should always be coordinated. If you start your arm swing late, then you start your count late. Coaches, the good ones anyway, are looking at you and talking to their players. If you are counting in your head, but do not give a VISIBLE count as well, you put the team and that player at a disadvantage. And yes, I understand that by starting your count late that you put the other team at disadvantage as well, but I would rather have a visible advantage for a team than an invisible disadvantage. (does that make sense?)

As for having a lot of other things to do . . . well, every official on the floor has a lot of stuff to do and a lot of things to worry about. That is why we learn to "multi-task."

So you give them 5 1/2 seconds? What's the rule say again?
Let me guess, this happened in a 5th grade girls' game?

I tend to agree with you too, but refereeing is not an exact science. I gave you one example where I may not have started my count exactly at the time the player receives the ball, backcourt to frontcourt. Players dribbling up the court, no pressure and you're not even counting with your arms b/c he's almost over the half court line. All of a sudden he loses control of the ball, stops his dribble, or the defense pops up and traps the ball. Now, if I haven't shown a count, I would say we are at about 3 or 4 seconds and start my count from there, instead of starting my backcourt count over at zero b/c I didn't start a backcourt count with my arms. I don't think that's right either.

Another example: Shot clock reads 23 and my hand count is 9, or shot clock reads 27 and my hand count is 10. Am I not going to call a violation because my count doesn't match the shot clock? In as much as possible I agree that the arm count should match the invisible count, but it is not an absolute. Hopefully, this type of thing won't determine the outcome of a game, if called, but continued mismatch of arm and invisible count, could show some inconsistency in officiating mechanics.

Is this really what coaches and evaluators look at? If they were concerned about whether the violation, or lack of one, was proper, wouldn't they time the play to check?

They might. But the official does not have the benefit of the evaluator's stopwatch. He/she only has the physical count. Being off in the speed of your count is not desireable, but is understandable. Ignoring your own count is indefensible.

Or starting it late, or not having one, or.... Good points.

That is why an official should ALWAYS show their count, even if they "start" their count "a little late," or they don't think the count is going to have an impact. No way to fudge the outcome. It doesn't matter if the ball handler is walking up the floor uncontested, I show my BC count. OOB throw-in, same thing. I ALWAYS show my count, and when I am evaluating other officials, I tell them the same thing. The VISIBLE count is there for a reason, and we need to use effectively and efficiently, every time.

As for the shot clock (or game clock), if your count is FAST, adjust the speed of your count from that point forward to accomodate the discrepancy. EVERY evaluator and assignor I have ever had has told me, it is always a good idea to be "a little" slow on your counts. It you start a count "a little" late, then you are already slow, and continue from there. JMO

Agree, this should always be done, and 99.9% of the time I do it. But I am just being real when I say, sometimes, maybe the .01% of the time, I either forget, concentrating on something else at the time, lost concentration because of a call I think I just blew, or even a rotational switch and primary area has changed, and owe, I should be counting too.

However, I will also admit that I have never heard of a review of a 5 second call, or an evaluator looking at a tape to determine if it was a correct 5 second call violation based on the referee arm strokes. Never heard of that and I've never heard of a game coming down to a backcourt or 5 second throw in call violation. If the coach is worried about the fact the referee only showed 4 strokes of the arm and called a 5 second violation, he/she should probably be officiating and not coaching, and guaranteed, this coach is going to get out coached.

An assigner - not evaluator - will look at it when they receive a tape from a coach who thinks he/she got screwed.

Old school,

You are correct. WE ALL forget or get caught up with other aspects of our duties at different times. I am sure I have implied that I am perfect when it comes to counts, but believe, I am NOT. I guess I should say, "an official should ALWAYS try . . ."

As for games coming down to 5-second counts, or BC counts. I have had at least 4-5 in the past 2 years come down to just that. And, when a coach is pressing looking for that call, or the offensive coach is checking the count to see if a TO needs to be called, I want to be "johnny-on-the-spot!"

As for coaches calling assignors or sending in tapes . . . I had a coach do that to one of my partners last season. He called our assignor and scratched the official because he wasn't consistently visible on his counts, and the coach didn't like it. It happened in a game that wasn't close (10-12 points), and he won, but I guess he had a point to make. Just thought I would share.

Thanks for sharing, I would have never guessed that. So what I have learned is the coaches, or at least the informed coaches are watching your arm movements to determine count. I have always kept 2 counts. One in my head and the external arm movement, but they weren't always in sync. The one in my head is the one that I go by, but now I will make a bigger effort to stay in sync with my arm movement, based on this post/tread. I hope the assigner got back with the official so that he can at least learn. Too often, you don't get asked back to a school or a tournament and never know the reason why. I do not like that, but there's not a lot we can do about it.