OTOH, it can also inhibit advancement, because the high level player more than likely has some misconceptions about the rules that will be hard to shake. It's also possible he has some biases (defense or offense) that will bleed into his game.

These are at least as likely as quicker advancement because of some Tebowish intangibles that he gained from playing at a "high level."

Crap?

Really? Just because his opinion is different than yours makes his opinion crap?

Maybe this is that "god complex" from earlier in the thread...

Yeah. He's trashing an entire group of officials because they haven't played recently or at all....that if they haven't, they just will not be able to be as good of an official. He's insinuating that only those played recently can properly call this play....that older officials that played a long time ago or those that never played can't. That is crap.

While former players may very well be able to be good officials and potentially have a head start in some areas over those that didn't play, they are just as likely to make crappy officials. It is sort of like the "I used to be a ref" statement you get from some coaches.

If what he said was any where near accurate, assignors would never want veteran officials because they were too far from having played. Last time I checked, assignors tend to prefer experienced officials over rookies who just finished playing.

He didn't trash anybody. He said "I THINK..." followed by his thoughts that being a player helps someone differentiate...you obviously got offended by that. Why? Who knows...but saying he trashed some group of people simply because you disagree with his thoughts on the matter? That's ridiculous.

For the record, I disagree with his thoughts on the matter also...but that doesn't make his thoughts "crap".

Ok...fair enough...perhaps too strong of a reaction on my part. I've just met too many people that, just because they played, they think they're better. Unfortunately, the ones with that attitude often hit a wall that others, whether recent players or not, often pass right by.

Sure, it can help. But it doesn't establish the ceiling of how good an official can be...it just shifts the broad spectrum of the two overall groups relative to each other...but there is a dramatic amount of overlap in the ability levels and the best (and worst) can come from either group. It may shift the starting point such that former players may get a head start...but there is nothing they know that non-players can't learn.

I thought his particular thoughts on this issue were crap, even though I didn't see him as trashing anyone in particular.

Agreed...having played the game might help some people in their career, and might hurt others. Not one of those things that anyone can say 100% positive one way or the other...the 2 officials I know personally who have made it to Final Four status were not basketball players at all - one played football in college and the other ran track.

Just wanted to bring this up again
 

To go back to my post on the second page of the thread: there's nothing in the NFHS definition of a flagrant foul which says the act has to be intentional. They are "...of a violent...nature" and involve "dead-ball contact...at any time which is extreme." The NCAA-W D-I official who sent those comments seems to have forgotten that aspect.

For that matter, there's nothing in the NCAA definition of a Flagrant 2 technical foul which says the act has to be intentional but at least NCAA gives the option of a contact dead ball technical if you don't feel the player should be ejected.

To me, having watched this over and over at real speed and then frame by frame, at a minimum this is a dead ball contact foul every way I slice it. Even if, as some state, he was swinging his leg to get free of the other player, that doesn't give him free reign to swing it the way he wants without consequence. To me, that is not normal movement of his leg.