Tennessee/Texas 5sec. call

[bigdogrunnin]

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."

[Old School]

Originally Posted by bigdogrunnin

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.

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.

[bigdogrunnin]

Originally Posted by Old School

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.

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

[Old School]

Originally Posted by bigdogrunnin

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.

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.