Juulie, the other thing that Camron Rust is assuming is that the only people frustrated by the PBOA system are the people who think they should be getting play-off games but aren't, or the ones who think they deserve something they don't...you know the people from PBOA that I associate with, and you know that they don't fit either of those stereotypes. The people who I have discussed the system with are people who ARE going to State tournaments and ARE doing championship games, and they don't like the system very much at all...

Then why don't those people decline the assignments?? If they decline, it gives someone else a chance.

I do know of people doing tourneys and championship games that don't like the way things are. They think they should be in an even higher level tourney than they are or should be getting MORE of the big games that are being spread around. I've never heard anyone complain about getting too many big games.

They're not complaining about the games and they certainly are not going to complain to you. But they think the system stinks too, but are content where they are. This is consistent to what I have experienced as well.

CT Tournament
 

In Connecticut, the coaches "vote" in the state tournament officials. Believe it or not, they always select the best officials to do their games. Just to give you full disclosure, I did not get selected this year, but I've been to six or seven games over the past three weeks to watch my colleagues work, and they are considered to be the best officials on our board, by their ratings, of which 80% is based on ratings from their fellow officials. The "cream seems to rise to the top". Both coaches and officals seem to agree on who the best officials are. I know that it's hard to believe, but it's true. There's not a single official on the tournament list who would get a "Why is he or she on the tournament list?" from me.

You didn't say D-1 in your original post. This is the 1,257th time you have been wrong.

It ain't that way in northern VA.

What are you talking about now? Another hater in the forum...you really need to get out more. Now, is it possible, you have something of value to share on the topic of discussion? If not, do us all a favor and quite hating on your fellow referee's so much. Oh, and one more thing, by this time next year, I'm sure I will have made 1,275 more mistakes, by your standards of course.

You need only 1274 now, since you put an apostrophe in "referee's". :eek:

You misspelled intramural. I'm just saying....

Billy, ummm, sorry to bother you. But you've got something on your nose. :D

This is absolutely not the same as "the best officials." Well, unless the officials who worked the tourney are the only officials that you wouldn't question. But I'm pretty sure if you looked around, there are other officials in your group who could have worked the tourney also without raising any eyebrows.

I think that's kind of rainmaker's point too: If there are x number of officials from a group who would be widely considered a good choice for working the tourney, why are only a fraction of that group ever given the chance?

Nope, my post had the intended result. You made several mistakes in posting your (you would have said "you're") reply. Have a nice day. :p

From BillyMac: "There's not a single official on the tournament list who would get a "Why is he or she on the tournament list?" from me."

From Back In the Saddle: "This is absolutely not the same as "the best officials." Well, unless the officials who worked the tourney are the only officials that you wouldn't question. But I'm pretty sure if you looked around, there are other officials in your group who could have worked the tourney also without raising any eyebrows."

True, but there are only a limited number of spots to be filled. In Connecticut, only about 60% of the teams make the single elimination state tournament, thus decreasing the number of officials that need to work. The point that I was trying to make was, that in our system, those who make it seem to deserve it, i.e the coaches ratings and our peer ratings seem to agree. You are right in that there are other officials who don't make it who may not be better than those that do make it, but are certainly as good as those who do make it.

There's probably more than a correlation here, maybe a cause and effect. Those who are considered the best by our peer ratings get the most games, thus getting the most exposure, and thus getting a chance to get votes by the coaches. In other words, work a lot of games, improve your chances of getting selected by the coaches.

I can't explain in fully, but here we get very little "grumbling" about who makes or doesn't make the state tournament. We spend most of our time "grumbling" about our own peer rating system.