Volleyball anyone?

[JugglingReferee]

Originally Posted by BktBallRef

Stupid is as stupid does, Forest.

Actually, it is Forrest [Gump].

Just like you'd rather have two desserts and only ever visit one desert, you'd watch Forrest Gump twice, and only visit a forest once.

Edit: as for volleyball, have you seen the tall leggy women that play at the higher levels?

[jmaellis]

07/08 will be my third season officiating VB, my second officiating BB. I really like them both and can't really say which I would choose over the other if I had to drop one.

Obviously, there is no comparison with regard to the physical aspect of the games; BB you run, VB you don't.

Mentally, my personal experience is that VB has been more challenging than BB, more so as the referee than as the umpire. I've struggled with recognizing proper alignment/overlaps at serve and making sure that I know who is who in the back row during play.

I have a great deal of respect for those officials who can somehow memorize the entire line up and recognize an alignment error with just a glance. Some of the teams will line up is such a bizarre alignment that you would swear that they are overlapped, yet they are not; others will purposely assemble illegally and then just before serve they adjust to make their alignment legal .. sheesh!

Illegal back row attacks .... I've missed more of them than I care to mention.

And now in CA the Libero can serve .. for crying out loud!

[BktBallRef]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

Actually, it is Forrest [Gump].

Just like you'd rather have two desserts and only ever visit one desert, you'd watch Forrest Gump twice, and only visit a forest once.

Edit: as for volleyball, have you seen the tall leggy women that play at the higher levels?

I wasn't aDDreSSing FoRRest Gump.

I was aDDreSSing Forest Refnrev.

BuTT thanks for your interest.

[Andy]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

Edit: as for volleyball, have you seen the tall leggy women that play at the higher levels?

....with the nice, tight shorts on.....

[MCBear]

I hate to burst your bubble, guys, but volleyball is the most difficult sport to officiate, period!

Now, before you burst a jugular after reading that sentence, hear me out. I started out as a basketball official and worked the sport for 10 years, I proceeded to umpire high school baseball and fast-pitch softball as well as summer ball. Those sports were easy for me to do because I had experience with the games that I was officiating. Volleyball, however, was a whole different case.

I originally decided to do volleyball because I remembered what it was like, freezing my butt off on the football sideline at the end of October, early November in NorthWest Ohio. So, I decided to officiate volleyball.

Yes, the pay for officiating volleybal is pretty decent, but if you are going to do a good job, you better be willing to work your tail off to learn the game. BktBallRef, you have obviously never studied the game of volleyball because you never played it competitively. You sound exactly like a lot of the guys who thought that reffing volleyball was easy money, like stealing it from a baby. It is only that if you don't take the time to learn how to officiate the game properly.

I freely admit, that of all the sports that I officiated, I disliked (read that "hated") volleyball the most because (1) I had never played the sport and (2) every time the ball is touched, it is a judgment call as to whether the contact is legal or not. I couldn't see the double for the longest time, but I worked my tail off to follow the advice of coaches and officials whom I respected. Plus, learning when a team is out of rotation with some of the "stacks" that coaches have devised will almost drive you cross-eyed trying to figure out what the heck the team is doing.

What I am saying, in a nutshell, is what I heard a very respected volleyball official say, "Refereeing volleyball is easy...unless you want to do it correctly! Then, you are going to have to do some serious work to get it right."

Those kids on the court deserve the best job of officiating that can be provided. If the official isn't there for the kids and the love of the game, I can guarantee that particular individual is not going to be officiating volleyball very long because they will either consider it a "boring" sport or the coaches will not put up with the attitude of the ref being there just for the paycheck.

After 10 years of refereeing basketball and 11 years of umpiring baseball/softball, the only sport that I do any more is volleyball and I think that I may finally be getting an idea what the sport is about as I start my 25th season.

[FMadera]

Originally Posted by BktBallRef

Call it stupid if you like but I'm not just a football/basketball official who's just saying it. I've worked volleyball. I've never made so much for doing so little. It's a piece of cake, it's boring as hell, it's stealing money. In my area, the guys who are are now in the 60's and 70's call volleyball. There's nothing to it.

No matter how many people say it, it doesn't make it any less ignorant.

Everyone I've heard make that statement (and there have been many) are those who think it's easy because they are sorely lacking in the knowledge that it takes to be a good volleyball official. They call things that shouldn't be called, don't call things that should be called, and are so utterly ignorant on the current skills being demonstrated that they wind up having no clue what's going on out there.

If there was "nothing to it," then why do you think there are actually distinctions between good and bad VB officials? Wouldn't all VB officials be the same if there was "nothing to it?"

I'm sure there are guys in your area in their 60s and 70s doing ALL sports. Are those sports just as "easy" in your mind?

If you don't like reffing VB, I can totally understand that. It's not a sport you can come in and understand. It takes work, sometimes years to understand some of the nuances...you know, if you actually care enough to work at the craft, as opposed to "stealing money." But to say it's an easy sport to ref is really laughable...especially at the higher levels.

Thanks for the hearty laugh.

[mbyron]

A lot of guys around here seem to have the same attitude: that VB is "easy" and like "stealing money."

In a couple respects, they are correct: officiating volleyball does not require officials to run or even move much, and that's easy compared to, say, basketball.

Also, the mechanics are simple, partly since movement is not required, and that's easy compared to, say, baseball.

The rules are, I think, much simpler than baseball's, so that's easier as well (although I agree with Felix that there are nuances).

What I've found challenging so far (and I'm a novice) is judging hits and keeping track of alignments. So much of VB officiating depends on these skills, which I suspect take a while to develop. And this, it seems to me, is at least as difficult as judging advantage/disadvantage when calling basketball fouls.

[Back In The Saddle]

Let the games begin