The Beauty of Summer Sight-Seeing
 

So I'm at this Varsity Summer tournament and see quite possibly the funniest thing I've ever seen as far as coach/official interaction.

Game before my teams game, Team A is defending Team B and B1 is blatantly carrying the ball as he crosses halfcourt. To protect against a pesky defender A1, B1 is dribbling with his back to the defender, carrying the ball (fully cupping the ball and holding it after each bounce) with his left hand while waiting for a teammate to get open. Coach A is screaming for a doubledribble/carrying call, and the officials says "if he doesn't go by him, there's no advantage so Im not gonna call that, come'on coach".

So that game ends, my game goes with another set of officials, and Team A happens to play Team C after our game. Team C wins the tip and there is a turnover out of bounds. Team A inbounds the ball from the baseline with Team C dropping back to a 2-3 zone. A3 passes to A1, who takes one dribble, then carries the ball in one hand while walking 4 or 5 steps before bouncing the ball again. The Trail official (the one from team A's previous game) looks over at Coach A as the whole Team C bench is screaming for a travel/carry and the Team A bench just cracking up laughing...

Hilarious...

A great example of why JR says that adv/disad should rightly be applied to contact in the judgment of fouls, but not to violations. :eek:

This official allowed the sport to become a farce. :mad:

Sadly, he probably believes that he is doing a quality job of officiating. :(

I agree, it's one thing not to pay too close attention to the carry at this level because you have other things to worry about, even as trail. But to tell the coach you're not calling it because there's no advantage is just setting a lot of folks up to fail later, including the official.

As far as advantage/disadvantage goes: Even if the ballhandler does not "go by" the defender with the carry, isn't the defender at a disadvantage because he does not know if the suspended dribble is being terminated and is unable to make the proper play? For example, if the ballhandler is picking up the ball and terminating his dribble, the defender can pressure up on the ball further without worrying about another dribble, whereas if the dribble is live, the defender must be cautious of pressuring to hard.

The officials at this tournament were constantly talking about advantage disadvantage, especially when it came to hand checking the dribbler. I had a nice discussion with a few officials between games about this subject. Asked why a 2 handed hip check was not called a foul, one official said "well, he still got by his defender, so there was no advantage". When I asked "well even though he got by the first defender that held him, it slows him down enough for the second help defender, isn't that an advantage gained?" We had a good discussion about this with no real resolution, but it was interesting and thought provoking. All except for one ref who said "it's only foul if i call it a foul" and walked away. He was a short guy.

BillyMac's Law ...
 

Always Call The Obvious.

If you do, you can't do wrong.

Perhaps he was really just a small man. :eek:

PS Can we leave Chuck out of this? :D

I've been taught 2 hands is an automatic.

Obviously, you were taught by someone who actually reads what the NFHS publishes. (But don't tell Rut. ;) )

2008-09 POINTS OF EMPHASIS
...
2. ROUGH PLAY
...
B. Hand-checking Defenders are not permitted to have hands on the dribbler or offensive players away from the ball. Hand-checking is not incidental contact; it gives a tremendous advantage to the person using illegal hands/tactics. An offensive player who uses his/her hands or body to push off in order to create a more favorable position has committed a foul. Regardless of where it happens on the floor, when a player:
1) Continuously places a hand on the opposing player – it is a foul.
2) Places both hands on a player – it is a foul.
3) Continuously jabs a hand or forearm on an opponent – it is a foul.

Rut won't care, Blydic isn't in Illinois.

Too bad that they didn't understand the concept of advantage/disadvantage though.

As Nevada said, the NFHS has given out to officials multi guidelines on defensive contact via case plays and POE's. So has the NCAA. And these guidelines get repeated over and over. And yet, some officials will still ignore 'em and use their own.

Sad.

In my neck of the woods this whole handchecking topic is the way it is in summer ball. It's just part of the culture.:eek:

I don't do very much summer ball and this is part of the reason. It gets pretty rough. The rules are set up so players have unlimited fouls and they know it. Partners don't want you to call anything short of murder,coaches-well I don't know what coaches want except every call to go their way, and for myself it's not that fun.

There was a thread about mechanics or no mechanics in summer ball. Part of that thread was getting the calls right and working on adv/disadv. Heck around here in summer ball adv/disadv is really would he get time in county jail for that ? If yes tweet, if no pass.

So being I have no interest in changing the summer ball culture of where I live I only do it when the assignors get jammed up and I get the last minute call.

Ball-Handler / Hand-Checking
 

This is part of my extended pregame, not every game, just when I work with a rookie official, or with an official for the first time:

Ball-Handler / Hand-Checking
Places both hands on a ball-handler, it is a foul.
Continuously places a hand on the ball-handler, it is a foul.
Continuously jabs a hand or forearm on a ball-handler, it is a foul.
Remember RSBQ. If the dribbler’s Rhythm, Speed, Balance, or Quickness are affected, we should have a hand-checking foul.

I would add "almost always" in most of those. If I've got a defender (who has been beat) with two hands on a dribbler who is headed for an undefended layup (but is not yet in the act of shooting) I'm not blowing the whistle and taking away two points....unless I plan on calling it an intentional.

“Rhythm, Balance, Speed and Quickness” is what you should apply when calling hand-check fouls or perimeter contact.

If none of these things are disrupted, then you do not need to call a foul. Fouls still have to have an advantage/disadvantage element to them. They also did not throw out the incidental contact rule either in this POE. And if anyone attended any of the camps I attended and you called a foul simply for two hands on a player, you would have heard about it a lot. ;)

Peace

Or Indiana, Texas, Kentucky, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi or any other state that I worked with officials from that were not calling "touching." :)

Peace