Level of Officiating

[iref4him]

Last night I was evaluating two referees officiating a boys varstiy game. One official is young and up coming. The official is a veteran. The game has past the veteran and the young official has gone to camps to improve himself. As the game went on, I noticed the younger official going away from his game and officiate like the veteran. I have seen him 5 times this year. This was his worst game.

Afterwards we talk. He said that he felt so out of sync with the other official that he just lost his focus. I told him that you can't officiate to the level of your partner. If he is doing a bad job, you have to maintain your game or step it up. With the other games, he has worked with much better officials than his partner last night. He officiated better at those other games. He said he had a hard time feeling comfortable with the partner last night.

I told him I understand and I have been there also. He was a coach at one time. I asked him how many times did you tell your players who cannot just play to the level of your competition. You have to play your game, even when the team is weaker than yours. I said the same for officiating. You cannot officiate to the level of your partner. You have to work harder when the partner is pulling his or her weight. YOU have to maintain, stay focused, call your primary, and when necessary step it up to manage the game.

My question is - do you beleive that you sometimes officiate to the level of your partner(s)? What do you when he feel yourself going there?

[mbyron]

Originally Posted by iref4him

My question is - do you beleive that you sometimes officiate to the level of your partner(s)? What do you when he feel yourself going there?

I try not to. Sometimes this phenomenon is driven by a desire to be "consistent," when we should be striving to be good.

[fullor30]

Originally Posted by iref4him

Last night I was evaluating two referees officiating a boys varstiy game. One official is young and up coming. The official is a veteran. The game has past the veteran and the young official has gone to camps to improve himself. As the game went on, I noticed the younger official going away from his game and officiate like the veteran. I have seen him 5 times this year. This was his worst game.

Afterwards we talk. He said that he felt so out of sync with the other official that he just lost his focus. I told him that you can't officiate to the level of your partner. If he is doing a bad job, you have to maintain your game or step it up. With the other games, he has worked with much better officials than his partner last night. He officiated better at those other games. He said he had a hard time feeling comfortable with the partner last night.

I told him I understand and I have been there also. He was a coach at one time. I asked him how many times did you tell your players who cannot just play to the level of your competition. You have to play your game, even when the team is weaker than yours. I said the same for officiating. You cannot officiate to the level of your partner. You have to work harder when the partner is pulling his or her weight. YOU have to maintain, stay focused, call your primary, and when necessary step it up to manage the game.

My question is - do you beleive that you sometimes officiate to the level of your partner(s)? What do you when he feel yourself going there?

Just the opposite for me. I tend to focus harder knowing that we as a crew have a weak link. It actually happened last night, with a very weak partner and the R and I talked about it prior to our pregame. That said, you may find yourself trying to cover his area to compensate for his perceived shortcomings, which I try not to do. Rather than save comments for halftime, at timeouts I may bring up concerns that need to be corrected immediately.

Conversely, I've been with top officials, and on the food chain, I'm the third guy as far as experience goes. I don't ever think I was the weak link however and try and bring my level of officiating up to my partners.

As the sales guy at Best Buy told me "your sound system is only as good as it's weakest link", so it may apply to an officiating crew.

[Loudwhistle]

Originally Posted by fullor30

Just the opposite for me. I tend to focus harder knowing that we as a crew have a weak link. It actually happened last night, with a very weak partner and the R and I talked about it prior to our pregame. That said, you may find yourself trying to cover his area to compensate for his perceived shortcomings, which I try not to do. Rather than save comments for halftime, at timeouts I may bring up concerns that need to be corrected immediately.

Conversely, I've been with top officials, and on the food chain, I'm the third guy as far as experience goes. I don't ever think I was the weak link however and try and bring my level of officiating up to my partners.

As the sales guy at Best Buy told me "your sound system is only as good as it's weakest link", so it may apply to an officiating crew.

Agree completely, I have a hard time not watching my partners area in two man when I know they are weak. The longer you reff the more you get accustomed to "knowing" where to look for key fouls or violations during common plays. I know watching my partner's area is wrong, but as a crew we are judged as a unit and sometimes game flow can be attained by picking up some of their missed calls. I'm mainly talking about games below HS. In three man HS, I generally will not call a foul in another person's area unless it is dirty.

[bbcof83]

As a younger official I do find myself struggling with this issue from time to time. In my under-varsity games I have no problem calling my game and, if needed, I don't hesitate to step up, "be the man" for that game, and take control no matter the experience of my partner. I haven't yet put my finger on why I can't do this at the varsity level yet. Probably just inexperience...

I think mbyron is right that sometimes "officiating down to your partner's level" is driven by a drive for crew consistency. I know this is wrong but in my head I'm thinking: "I'm not about to start calling everything to compensate for him/her. And if s/he let a lot of contact go at that end, I better let it go at this end. Right?" That's what goes through my head at the time. In actuality, I'm lowering myself to my partner's level. How do we combat this erred thinking?

[mbyron]

Originally Posted by bbcof83

I know this is wrong but in my head I'm thinking: "I'm not about to start calling everything to compensate for him/her. And if s/he let a lot of contact go at that end, I better let it go at this end. Right?" That's what goes through my head at the time. In actuality, I'm lowering myself to my partner's level. How do we combat this erred thinking?

Stay focused and call your game. Don't worry about "this end, that end," because if you're switching correctly (or initiate some extra switches) it will even out.

If a coach complains, just say, "Coach we're all doing our best out here." Leave it at that.

[Scratch85]

Originally Posted by mbyron

Sometimes this phenomenon is driven by a desire to be "consistent," when we should be striving to be good.

I had the good fortune of calling with a partner last weekend that I respect greatly and consider him to be one of the best officials in my area. He pregamed this very thing.

In his pregame he went over being consistent in short periods of time. As in, a couple of trips up and down the floor. I can't repeat his eloquent pregame but he basically inferred that there is a need to be consistent from one end to the other in a short period of time but it doesn't translate into calling to your partners level the whole game.

I've thought about it a lot since and I agree with him. If your partner passes on what you think is a foul, you may want to pass on that same contact at the other end on the subsequent trip down. Hopefully, after a few trips when you call that same contact a foul (because you consider it a foul) your partner will do the same thing at the other end and as the game goes on everyone gets closer to the same page.

Poorly worded but I hope the idea is there.

[Clark Kent]

Originally Posted by iref4him

My question is - do you beleive that you sometimes officiate to the level of your partner(s)?

Absolutely. I, like bbcof83 am typically the young/new guy on the crew and my biggest objective is to just fit in. My objective is to be consistent. The players and coaches can adjust to calls if we are consistent.

That being said, I also don't feel that I need to pass on obvious fouls or make stuff up just to match my partner's play calling. My goal as an individual is to prevent our crew from going into a "lessened" state of officiating. There are calls that I may have to have a whistle on to keep the crew afloat. In short it is a fine line between "saving" the crew and not stepping on partners toes.

Originally Posted by iref4him

What do you when he feel yourself going there?

I try to self talk. I try very hard to make myself aware of the foul counts, time in the game, as well as what our previous calls have been and at a timeout ask my partner(s) what they think. Essentially, I try to have an absolute focus on the game when I feel myself going downward.

[zm1283]

The hardest thing for me is in 3-person when one of your partners is calling things one way, and the other is calling things another way...what do you do? I felt like on one occasion this year that one partner was very tight and one very loose, so I couldn't figure out which way to go as the youngest one on the crew. I would pass on something that the loose one didn't call, then call something similar a few minutes later that the tight one had called earlier in the game. Just very hard to feel like you're consistent when your partners aren't consistent. On the other hand I've had some VERY good games this year where all 2 or 3 of us are on the same page and clicking and things go really smoothly.

[fiasco]

Originally Posted by iref4him

My question is - do you beleive that you sometimes officiate to the level of your partner(s)? What do you when he feel yourself going there?

Ugh. Yes. This is one of my biggest struggles.

I've worked with a lot of 1st year guys this year for some reason. I try to use it to my advantage. I think "I'm the most experienced guy out on the floor, I have to take charge."

Not take charge as in start calling everything on the floor, but make sure I'm crisp with my mechanics and making sure to "manage" the game.

Sometimes it works well, but it fell apart for me the other night in a BJV game. My partner made good calls, but his mechanics were very weak, and we were working a game with one of the most annoying coaches in the district. He got under my partner's skin on several occasions (none of which I was aware of until he told me later). I spent too much time worrying about my partner not falling apart that I started looking in his area way too much and stopped focusing on my game.

Toward the end of the game, my partner let the coach rip him a new one and didn't do a thing. I was waiting and waiting for him to issue a technical (which would have been his first) but it never came, so I did it for him.

It was a rough game with several missed calls, a few of them my fault. And I did feel like I went down to his level a bit. But then there are times where I have worked with a varsity guy on a JV game, and man, those have been the best games of my career, so you never know....