Who says it has to be obvious to everyone?

If you're the L, and the ball is not your PCA, most everyone else is ball-watching, while you remain focused in your area. If you're the only one that has seen the post player remain in the lane, and show no sign of getting out, you have a job to do.

"Not that there's anything wrong with that"
 

Gross violator last night. Just for gits and shiggles I gave the coach a "forty-two" after the call. She thanked me when I went running by. Girl never dawdled in the lane again the rest of the game.

Well, you completely missed the point of my post. (I actually have done MS games -- albeit with no training when I was in HS and when no refs showed up for a game as an adult, but that's beside the point.) And I ref a lot of soccer.

I wholly get that calls get missed -- as a coach and parent I regularly tell my team and kid that BB is the toughest sport to ref and they have to play with what is being called on that day, whatever it is, without getting upset about it because calls will always be missed, even at the hightest levels. (And I tell my kid, who is usually the tallest kid on the court, that with a lot of MS refs, he flat out isn't going to get calls just because he's the tallest kid on the court).

The frustration I get with 3 seconds is that some newbie refs (and some who are the classic ref with 1 year of experience 10 times) seem so focussed on counting to three that they aren't watching the more important aspects of the game. The experienced refs on here say things about making sure a three second call is significant, not wanting to be a "good three second ref," and so forth. The bad rookies (like new soccer refs who focus on bad throw ins and whistling any time a ball touches a hand), seem to view three seconds as "hey, I know that rule!" and call it with great enthusiasm and rigor -- sometimes with a very fast count because they get excited about having something to call -- while not paying attention to overly physical play, undercutting jumpers, and blatant arm slaps on shots. Just as I tell new soccer refs to worry less about throw ins and pay attention to what is happening during the throw in that matters more, I'd love to have someone actually mentor some of our BB refs about where they could focus to referee the game rather than the key.

Yup, looking forward to HS next year and a different group of refs to observe. (And maybe once my kids get a bit older and slurp up less time, I may add basketball to my referee plate . . . but for the moment, I'd rather stay married than ref hoops.:cool:)