Video

[Scrapper1]

Originally Posted by Ch1town

I recently started breaking down my game tapes on a consistent basis, and I was wondering if any of you all practice this too? I figure if it works for college & NBA officials development, it can't hurt a mere HS official like myself.

Absolutely true. My first experience breaking down tape was at camp. The observer had a microphone and would make comments, so that when you watched the tape, you had the critique as you were watching the play. Very helpful.

If you're watching a tape without comments, there are several things that you can do. You can dissect a particular play -- watching for position, what you're looking at, evaluate your call or no call. You can watch how you run in transition or your general appearance -- one thing that was pointed out to me was my posture and tape helped me see this. You can watch your mechanics at the spot of the foul and while reporting.

As long as you watch the tape with a critical eye (not just, "wow, I look good!"), I think you will get some usefulness out of it; but the more you "nit-pick" yourself in each situation, the more you'll get out of it.

Originally Posted by jdmara

Does anyone have any thoughts about the best way to obtain video tapes of the games. Is it appropriate to ask a coach the following day to run off a copy? Should I ask the AD?

The best way is to bring somebody with you to the game who is willing to do it. If you have kids, you could bribe them to tape the game for you.

If you can't do that, then you can certainly call the AD and ask to have a copy for your own use. Just a warning, though, my own experience is that not too many high school AD's want to be bothered with this. They may say, sure, I'll pass it along to the AV guy, but don't hold your breath waiting.