Coaches comments
 

A very respected HS coach in our area was talking to a fellow ref/friend at a Christmas tourney and my friend asked him to name his pet peeves about officials and he said he only had two. Officials who ignore him and officials making calls out of position. He rarely had any beef with calls as he understands it's not easy.

I guessed the first one as it came up up in a survey several years ago as coaches main concerns regarding officials.

I can certainly empathize with being out of position concern. As officials, we also have a problem with partners possibly guessing on calls as they are straightlined or making calls out of their primary.

Reiterates the philosophy of don't guess, if you missed it, so be it, but don't guess.

I may run my own survey as I bump into coaches in stands taking in a game.

I'm becoming more and more comfortable with letting something go if I didn't see it properly (straightlined). When asked, I've been able to simply tell the coach I couldn't see and and tell him why. It's worked.

Out of position is a really broad term. It would interesting to hear exactly what he means by out of position.

Agreed. "Coach, it very may have been a foul, but I didn't see it" It really does work and it's a factual statement(not one you want repeat of course,only good for one per coach);)

My sense from my friend was when a ref is straightlined or is really 'reaching' or as we like to say poaching and it's a guess call. The coach said he can live with an official not seeing the play, but don't compound it by guessing.

Fair enough.

Usually it means that he didn't agree with your call. :)

Coachs don't watch the officials when play is going on. They watch their team and their opponents, just like they're supposed to. The only time they notice us is when we blow a whistle or they think we should be blowing a whistle. I doubt very much that most coaches actually know what position we should be in relative to ball location.

As for the ignoring part, coaches do deserve a (short) answer to a question imo. What they don't deserve is a long discussion holding up play or an argument about a call or non-call.

He keeps smiling. Kinda creepy.





:D

From The Dark Side ...
 

I coached a middle school team for over twenty-five years, including twenty years in which I both coached, and officiated. What Jurassic Referee pointed out is 100% true. Unless a coach has a second head, or a second pair of eyes, he can't watch his team, his opponents, the scoreboard, his bench, and the officials. It just ain't possible. Something has to be ignored, and like Jurassic Referee said, it's usually the officials, unless the coach disagrees with their calls, and then they get a lot of attention, in my case, some very polite, respectful questions, yeah, sure, that's it, some very polite, respectful questions, yeah, that sounds good.

While for the most part I agree, what coaches will notice about officials is when they are lazy/don't hustle/can't physically get it done. Frankly, it's also one of my pet peeves.

That said, "out of position" may mean an official further away making a call (even if it happens to be his call).

As others have said, I doubt if most coaches have any idea of what "out of position" means. If he said that officials who don't hustle are a pet peeve of his, I'm sure that most officials would agree with that one.

As far as being ignored, I wonder if he understands the difference between a reasonable question and a monologue of "three, three, three" or "that's a reach"? :rolleyes:

trust me,he knows.

Having done both for many, many years, I tend to agree very much with the coach's two pet peeves. I KNOW where the officials are SUPPOSED to be.

To satisfy the coach's pet peeves (and mine), an official has to hustle up and down the floor to be in the best position position he/she can be (sometimes we still get straight-lined as Shaqs points out, but it should not be a common theme). Secondly, as Jurassic points out, a SHORT explanation as to what a referee saw (What did he do? -- IF not requested on EVERY FOUL or violation) is appropriate. It is as simple as, "Coach, he was holding a jersey with his backside hand" will generally suffice. If it goes any further to "no he didn't" I will just keep going. Some officials at that point want to prove their manhood/womanhood by getting into a lengthy (and game interupting discussion). Both from a coaching AND from an officiating standpoint, I see little point in such discussions. Answer and move on.

When an official simply runs away PRIOR to answering my initial question, I get the impression that the official was not confident in his/her call and has no real explanation. I know MANY officials who employ this technique. I don't like to see them when I arrive to coach AND I don't like to see them when I arrive to referee.

Hustle, get in position, do the best you can and quickly explain calls that a coach may not have had a good angle to see and move on.

Just my $.02, again.

Don't you get that short explanation when the foul was reported? "White, 22, holding".

My problem with the majority of these "questions" is that I don't really believe that the coach typically really doesn't know what they did (or at least what the official thinks they did) - after all, didn't I just come to the table and say what they did?

They just want the chance to complain about the call, and the smarts ones know that if they pretend they are on Jeopardy, they can justify the complaint as a "question".

Yeah, well, so what? If a coach asks what the kid did, why does it hurt to tell him that the player gave a two handed push in the back to clear space for the rebound (or whatever)?

Maybe many of you didn't have this experience, but my progression as an official started with me having a hard time looking the table in the eye when reporting a foul. Then it was easier for me to do that, but talking to a coach about it would be difficult. Eventually, I got to the point where I'd be happy walking up and having the discussion -- confident in what I saw and why I called what I did.

That's why he put the caveat, "If not requested on every foul or violation." You're right, you can normally tell which ones have legitimate questions as opposed to the chronic whiners. I'll answer the first group, and the second group generally gets one answer from me. How they respond to the answer will also clue me in as to which group they belong.

If they nod their head, or say ok (or any body language that gives that signal), we're good and they will get another explanation if asked politely later in the game.

It's kind of like the NFL instant replay rule.

1. There is a limited number of times per game that they can do it.
2. Successful exchanges will give them extra opportunities.
3. Unsuccessful exchanges burn opportunities.

A difference is, if the exchange is sufficiently hostile (they want to turn it into an argument), I reserve the right to refuse further questions at my discretion.