I'll be Seeing These Guys Tomorrow

[jTheUmp]

Consider this situation that happened in one of my games last week:

JV boys. 2nd half. 2-person game. I'm trail, tableside, trapped, double-teamed ball handler A1 at the FT line extended very close to the sideline. My lead is rotated over to the strong side watching a very intense post matchup. Team A coach starts screaming about one of his players getting held at the top of the key.

Which one of us should be looking in that direction?

After the ball ended up going out of bounds off of Team B when A1 attempted to pass to his post player, the conversation went like this:
"Did you seen that hold?"
"No, coach, I didn't."
"Who is looking at that play?"
"Coach, that's the responsibility of the 3rd official who isn't here."
"Oh. Ok."

With that said, I do know a few officials in my association who will only work girls 3-person games because of some age/mobility issues. These are guys who are very good officials and who have officiated for 30+ years including State Finals games in the last few years. It's not because they're lazy, in one guy's case it's due to the fact that his knees are starting to go and he can't handle the extra running that a 2-person game requires. But if I was a coach, I'd want him on my game every time.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by jTheUmp

Consider this situation that happened in one of my games last week:

JV boys. 2nd half. 2-person game. I'm trail, tableside, trapped, double-teamed ball handler A1 at the FT line extended very close to the sideline. My lead is rotated over to the strong side watching a very intense post matchup. Team A coach starts screaming about one of his players getting held at the top of the key.

Which one of us should be looking in that direction?

After the ball ended up going out of bounds off of Team B when A1 attempted to pass to his post player, the conversation went like this:
"Did you seen that hold?"
"No, coach, I didn't."
"Who is looking at that play?"
"Coach, that's the responsibility of the 3rd official who isn't here."
"Oh. Ok."

With that said, I do know a few officials in my association who will only work girls 3-person games because of some age/mobility issues. These are guys who are very good officials and who have officiated for 30+ years including State Finals games in the last few years. It's not because they're lazy, in one guy's case it's due to the fact that his knees are starting to go and he can't handle the extra running that a 2-person game requires. But if I was a coach, I'd want him on my game every time.

For some reason, it's held up as a badge of honor when officials can run like gazelles up and down the floor. Very few officials with a lot of good experience can run like they could 20+ years ago. Should only the younger officials at peak conditioning be assigned to high level games?

(Don't we make better decisions when we are already in position and not trying to make all decisions on the dead run anyway?)

I doubt the coaches would be happy with that and many officials would be out of the game when their decision-making and situation handling are at their peak.