You conveniently edited out the :) that Bktballref put at the end of that sentence. It was meant in jest, probably because "sir" makes him feel like the old man he is. :D

Shut up shorty.

Ah. Well, age ain't nothin' but a number, anyway. To me, anyone with a Y chromosome, regardless of age, is a sir.

Officials' attire
 

All floor officials be in grey shirts for V games, stripes in sub-V games.

All table crew must be in some sort of identifying attire.

Some of us do both in the same night.

All shiny-like.

I've seen it done before.

What I'm meaning it that it should be required that during V games that the grey shirts be worn.

Why, chseagle? What difference does it make what color the shirts are...as long as they are uniform?

Heck, we were in black/white the other night at your school...was that so bad?

...and for the record, many of us have both gray shirts and black/white shirts.

(It makes you communicate with your partners before the game...);)

There's nothing wrong with the stripes, not meaning anything negative about grey vs. stripes.

Concerning the idea of table crew wearing some sort of uniform/identifier, the scorer should be made to wear stripes (not just a recommendation). The rest of the table crew should wear something identifying them as game management staff.

Actually when thinking back to some games, the stripes do stand out more when in a loaded gym.

Any idea who it was that decided the grey shirts can be used?

At least it's not as bad as the NBE Shirts with the number on the back or like in hockey with the name & number on the back, or the R(s) wearing the orange bands.

The whole idea of putting stripes on us was so the players would know who was playing and who was officiating. Striped shirts were designed to contast with the players' shirts, no matter what color they wore.

And if it weren't for Patrick Ewing, we'd be the only ones on the court with short-sleeved shirts.

I vote for those bright fluorescent green nylon safety vests.:D

AKA Designed to be seen/noticed

However why the idea of the grey shirts?

At least NFHS/NCAA have the officials' attire right. The NBE Officials' attire, to me, is ugly.

So every member of the table crew has to be licensed to be Traffic Control Officers?

That's not far from normal game day attire for me right now, as RookieDude knows.

Sooner or later, will be getting a new shirt for game days.

Or.......
 

Works for me - they certainly would be visible! :D:D

That's how we do it in one of the chapters I belong to. I have no idea why either but I suspect we are transitioning to all grey for every level.

So the table would be a distraction?

I thought all attention was supposed to be towards the players & officials on the court?

Welpe it was meant as a joke as a way to distinguish who's a veteran official & who's a 1st/2nd year official (rookie).

And no one got the joke because it's not just 1st/2nd year officials doing JV games.

I know I'm late to the party, but I wanted to throw my 2 cents in on late-game fouling.

The one major thing missed in the discussion is that for one year the Fed did change its mind about the strategy. We had the PoE in the early '00s that included the famous any foul after the coach says "Foul 'em" is intentional line. That experiment lasted one year and the PoEs given earlier returned things to their normal state.

Personally, I find the fouling strategy at best poorly conceived and at worst unsportsmanlike. But, fortunately, no one gave me the job of making the rules. What I don't understand is why they don't try to steal the ball instead of just fouling.

My personal approach when the defense is attempting to foul late in the game is to call any contact when the offense is not trying to avoid it. When the offense is trying to avoid being fouled, it has to actually be a foul, i.e. the offensive player must be put at a disadvantage.

I think Rich is right that borderline contact should be favored for a foul in this situation for player safety, but at the same time we must be careful not to but the offensive team at a disadvantage by calling fouls that aren't there.

And yes, the defensive team is getting an advantage by fouling or they wouldn't be doing it in the first place.

My preferred solution is a change in the rules that would make the strategy less likely to work for the defense. Something is wrong with the rules when the best chance to win is to intentionally break the rules. I think the idea of a triple bonus floated earlier has some merit.

It's impossible to tell the difference between your lame jokes and your lame posts.

Life imitates posts again.

Last night, the home team (state tourney team last year and winners of 2 state titles the past 4 years) went into a four corner stall with a 3 point lead at the end of the game while the visiting team (#1 in the state and defending state champions) tried desperately to foul. It took almost a minute for the foul as the team with the ball kept passing it around and the defense got there a bit late. I ignored all the attempted fouls on players that didn't have the ball anymore -- I was certainly watching for intentional or flagrant contact, but that's what it was going to take once the ball was out of the picture.

Home team held on and won by 5 after hitting 2 FTs with 1.8 seconds left. Great game.

Regardless, it is reality here.

Eggsxactly.

The 2005-06 POE read,

Conversely, a coach who yells, "Foul!" instructions to his or her team does not mean the ensuing foul is "automatically" an intentional foul – even though it is a strategic foul designed to stop the clock.

You're not going back far enough. That's after they changed it back. I need to go through my old books and see if I still have that one.

Yes, I did go back far enough. I went back to exactly the point I wanted to and that was to the second POE. I'm well aware that's where they clarified what they had posted in the '04-05 POE. That's why I posted it it.

AND, they didn't change anything. They simply clarified what the had included the year before. It was poorly worded and they had everyone calling INT fouls when the coach yelled "Foul!" That was never the intent of the Rules Committee.

My apologizes then. It appeared to me that you were trying to quote the PoE that I was referring to that had been reversed, not the reversing PoE.

I can't speak as to what the intent of the committee was, but I can tell you that we were instructed at the state rules interpretation meeting that year to call INT fouls when the coach yelled "Foul!" If it wasn't their intent, they didn't do a good job of communicating it to my state. So, in my state at least, it changed and changed back because of the PoE.

If they didn't mean to change it, wow, did they ever blow it.

See POE #5 in the 2000-01 NFHS rule book..."Acts that must be deemed intentional include when coach/player says 'watch, we're going to foul'. " If they said that, we were supposed to call an intentional foul on contact.

They then changed their minds on this a few years later.

That's the one. Thanks JR.

Yep, looked for it but couldn't find it. I still use the Athletic Rules Study rule and case books as archives but some reason didn't have the 2004 version. I remember the original POE but somehow missed it when i looked back.

Eastshire, our state rep was the chairman of the rules committee during a portion of that time. That's how i know the 2005 POE was actually a clariication of what they had orignially intended. Between the meeting and the printing, it didn't get worded properly.

Then you're in a position to know. I just know what happened at my rules meeting and like you said there was a huge disconnect.

Administrative/Team technical fouls (with the possible exception of playing with more than 5 players) would go to POI, while any technical foul charged directly to a player or coach (unsporting) continue to be enforced with two shots and the ball at the division line.

Division Line, Opposite Table, Opponent's Ball ...
 

I'm confused here. Are you talking about NCAA rules because this certainly isn't the case for NFHS rules. Of course, I know more about making sausage than I know about NCAA rules.

Title of the thread
 

It's a rule change suggestion.

I think Billy has taken to not reading thread titles today. ;)

It would explain a lot
 

Maybe he's just a bot.

'Tis The Season ...
 

Too much nog.

Ball check
 

Thanks RookieDude for the idea.

All personnel that work the table must be able to do a successful ball check before being allowed to work table.

Alcoholic or non-Alcoholic nog??

No, no, I promised to be good.....as difficult as it may be, I'm going to resist the temptation.........:D

LMAO Go ahead & say it

Kind of what I'm suggesting is that no one should be allowed to do table operations unless they have an understanding of the rules via the rule book.

Stop it, please.

Table personnel need to know how to do their jobs, and know what is not included in their jobs.

As has been mentioned in one thread or another -- you can teach 95% of that in about 5 minutes.

Ok, add the NCAA-M 3-point line to NFHS for boys' basketball.

However not everyone that does table gets training in what all their duties/responsibilities are.

Repeatedly I've had to remind those doing scorebook that they are to remain neutral, so not always is it known that a person working table must be neutral or that cheering is not allowed.

Absolutely not.

It's terrible working on college courts with 2 lines. I see no reason to move the lines in HS, same as you. Frankly, HS kids don't shoot all that well as it is.

Getting back to the original thread idea...

Could anyone tell me where the term "umpire" came from as it relates to a basketball official? Aside from your partner, when's the last time someone at a basketball game called you an "ump?"

I might suggest getting rid of the term "umpire" in basketball, going with "assistant referee" (or "A.R."), or calling the one in charge the "head referee." Once the ball is tossed, it's not like there's a huge disparity of duties or positioning (like referees and umpires in football).

Ask Dr. Naismith.

USA Basketball: Naismith's Original 13 Rules :)

I realize the duties have changed quite a bit since the Original 13 rules but I believe the designations are a nod to tradition more than anything else.

Assistant Referee doesn't make sense because for the most part, all of the officials have the same duties.

A couple leads...
 

Original Rules:
10. The umpire shall be the judge of the men and shall note the fouls and notify the referee when three consecutive fouls have been made. He shall have power to disqualify people according to Rule 5.
11. The referee shall be judge of the ball and shall decide when the ball is in play, in bounds, to which side it belongs, and shall keep the time. He shall decide when a goal has been made and keep account of the baskets, with any other duties that are usually performed by a scorekeeper.

There's also an article on the history of officiating in the Winter 2010 NFHS Official's Quarterly.

And then you will say "when was the last time someone called you an assistant referee?"

Not at all. When someone says, "hey ref!" or refer to "the refs," at least they would be correct.

Anyway, nice catch, Welpe. Obviously, I overlooked the original 13, but when you consider that referees and umpires had separate duties -- far different from today -- you wonder if the term "umpire" has long outlasted its use.

I think there is an abbreviation which is commonly used.

It's semantics.

Perhaps we should rename the endline since everyone calls it the "baseline." Or we could add an "over the back" foul. ;)

With the Boris Karloff mechanic?

Also known as the "creeping death" foul.

I saw that Karloff mechanic more than once at the UMaine/Boston U. game yesterday. To say such mechanics are discouraged by our organization would be an understatement. (When in Rome, I guess.)

Anyway, if you really want to get down to linguistics, Snaq, there are reasons why those two examples wouldn't work. "Umpire" is more of a semantics thing, I suppose, but it's more than about simply making a change to reflect common usage. That common usage would have to be literally accurate, as well.

I thought your whole reason was because we're never called "umpire." (common usage)

The accuracy of the terms is completely arbitrary and determined by the rule book. Heck, Arbiter uses R1, R2, and R3; but guys in my association automatically adjust to R, U1, and U2, during pregame. "Who's the R again?"

"Assistant Referee" has connotations to it that are negative, IMO. "Head referee" denotes more authority than really exists (again, IMO).

IOW, it ain't broke.

Scorebooks also have referee/umpire designations. Our Arbiter has R, U1 & U2 designations. My prior one in VT did as well. The fans, players and coaches don't know the rules anyway, so why make a change here?

Not whole. As you pointed out, it can't be change for change's sake. The change has to make verbal sense (whereas "baseline" and "over the back" have proven flaws).

I don't see anything negative about "A.R.," as it's used in soccer, but it's true that there's not a lot of authority involved for a "head" referee in basketball. For some reason, it doesn't stop us from asking, colloqually, "who's the boss tonight?"

For me, it just doesn't make sense that we're continuing to use a term that is rarely used or understood outside our circle, particularly if there's a clearer alternative.

You could say that about rules 1-10 as well.

Ref is short for referee. The other officials would have to be called assistant refs to be correct.

The arbiter uses whatever the administrator wants it is use.

So I guess all the people who never knew that there was a referee and an umpire are now going to know that there is a referee and an assistant referee? Seems like if they didn't know what the officials were called before they aren't going to magically just figure it out now.

Actually it is commonly understood that the lead official is called the referee and the others are called something else as it is common to many sports such as: Basketball, football, rugby, soccer, hockey, sumo wrestling...

There'd be a helluva mess if we had 5 referees on a football field.

I don't mind the two lines.

It's the extra ten feet I hate! :)

There's nothing incorrect about the current usage. And what's the proven flaw in "baseline" if we change it in the rule book. "Baseline" is an almost exact analogy to the change your proposing. A semantic change based on popular usage; nothing more.

As I was told, you can't have a baseline, if there aren't any bases.

FWIW, the NBA rule book uses both "baseline" and "endline." I just did a quick online search, and I only saw "endline" in FIBA, NCAA, and of course, NFHS.

There's nothing inherently wrong with either term; it's just that one is a rule term for an OOB line and one is a rule term for something else.

And what's with "sic," are you commenting on my use of a sentence fragment rather than a complete sentence? :D

Jeopardy! Please answer in the form of a question. ;)

LOL Yeah, that was it. (Question, not a fragment.) The journalist in me never dies. I spend four years getting a degree in journalism, and what do I do with it now? I type "[sic]" on a stinkin' online forum. :D

Really? I *love* the extra space. I actually feel like I get into a better run on a college court.

Where I feel like my legs weigh a ton is when the game is slow and I have to do a half-run / half-walk up and down to maintain good spacing. On a fast up-and-down I usually feel like working another game afterwards.

As In "Real Sicko" ...
 

Typo. It should have been, "sick". He must really know you well.

The NFHS actually did change their volleyball officials' designations a couple years ago, from referee and umpire to R1 and R2. But, in that case, it actually made sense. More widely used rules sets have long called them R1 and R2. The two officials have distinct responsibilities and the R1 has clear authority to overrule all other officials. The distinction is widely acknowledged in common usage, with the two officials often being called the "up official" and "down official".

But, in basketball there is only one common usage, and that's "Ref". The distinction between referee and umpire is minor and of no consequence to anyone except officials and assignors. The current designations are traditional and are consistent between rules sets.

It just ain't broke... :)