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Tue Nov 23, 1999, 05:11pm
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First, I apologize for the long post, but it is interesting:
I would like to hear from officials about a thesis paper my brother is preparing. He attends grad school at Duquesne University and is taking a course called "Media, Sports, and Society." After being exposed to officiating through me, he developed a unique thesis statement that his professor loved - and he is now working on: "The explosion of sports programming and the increased scrutiny of sports officials has led to the deterioration of authority and respect for officials at all levels." He is now attempting to prove this thesis. I must admit, I have many thoughts on the subject (some of which appear here). His comments to me went something like this: He postulates that back in the early 70s, sports programming was mostly limited to weekend coverage for a few hours on a few networks and maybe 6-8 minutes on the nightly news (mostly coverage of the local team or teams). At most, perhaps 2000 hours of sports programming per year (3 networks times 12 hours per weekend times 52 weeks plus local coverage). But now, with 24-hour sports channels, and a multitude of other channels showing a multitude of sports (TNT, TBS, for crying out loud, even FX and Lifetime broadcast sports) sports programming has exploded (one 24-hour channel alone has nearly 9000 hours of sports programming to fill in one year). And smack dab in the middle of all of this is the increased scrutiny of officiating. In the 70s, if an official blew a call (hey, it happens) in a game in a St. John's game, only New Yorkers heard about it. Now, the entire nation hears about - over and over again. It makes the 2:00 a.m. Sportscenter and gets replayed on the 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 editions. [For crying out loud, they were still talking about Phil Lucket's coin toss this past week on ESPN.] My brother also offers that the increased number of games being broadcast has opened positions for broadcasters who, in the 70s, wouldn't have even gotten close to a live mic - and don't know the rules. As a result, they criticize officials who make a good call because they don't know or understand the rules. (I heard an announcer say "how could the official call that a charge? the defender clearly wasn't set with both feet planted") We have all talked at interpretation meetings about how players at lower levels often imitate the play of NBA and college players (the hand-checking, the forearm checking, the jumping out of bounds and calling a time-out, etc.), so it doesn't seem that far-fetched to me that my brother may be right in extending this trend to the treatment of officials. I sent him copies of many of the stories of abuse of officials I read in Referee Magazine and I would love to see in this forum, comments from officials on his paper and on the subject as a whole. You can also e-mail him directly at [email protected]. I think he is looking for opinions on the validity of the thesis, as well as examples of mistreatment by coacher, players, or fans or officials. The best comment I heard so far from friends of mine who officiate is that even before games were on television, people had selective memories. That is to say that in a typical basketball game, each player may make 5 mistakes, each coach may make 3, and one official might make one. But guess whose mistake everyone involved in the contest is going to remember and talk about? The officials. And now because of all the hours of sports programming that needs to be filled, it is all the entire country talks about, until the next mistake. I apologize for the long post and I look forward to hearing comments from the group. 
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