should I have thrown a flag??

MN BB Ref · #9 (**permalink**) Wed Oct 22, 2003, 10:26am

Quote:

Originally posted by sm_bbcoach

Quote:

Originally posted by Ed Hickland

Quote:

Originally posted by MN BB Ref
A hold by any other name is still a hold...and they are illegal. If you were to only penalize the ones that "affect the play" you will undoubtedly hear from the opposing coach who didn't receive the call...and he is right. IN fact, I have no qualms about calling a hold (or block in the back for that matter) that is completely out of the play. To me that is stupid football, especially at the varsity level, and the players should realize that there is no need to even initiate contact in most of those cases.

Hopefully they will learn to play smarter football by learning from dumb mistakes.

Just my two cents worth...

I agree that a flag should have been thrown because a hold on a free kick could have an affect on coverage.

However, I disagree with the philosophy of throwing flags when the flags have absolutely no affect on the play unless it is unnecessary roughness.

Years ago when I started out I threw flags for almost everything. After working with various officials and observing games it become obvious the idea behind penalties are to keep one team from gaining an advantage. Example, if the play is to the left and a hold occurs 40 yards away on th eopposite side of the field, did the hold cause the offender to gain an advantage? The answer is no. So, why would you or should you throw a flag.

However, if the action on the opposite side of the field were a particularly rough block in the back it should be called because the offender is gaining th eadvantge of intimidation.

I agree. But is also a saftey issue as well.

I do understand what you are saying here, and logically I agree with you. However I see a couple of holes in that argument. First of all, a penalty has still been committed. Although every call is truly a judgment call, I would have a hard time explaining to a coach that the penalty we called against his team earlier is not being called against the opponent because it didn't affect the outcome of the play. A hold is a hold. I'm sure the coach could ask me to cite the rule that states that holds are only holds if they don't affect the outcome of the play. In that case I would be stuck.

Secondly, I decide not to call the hold because it doesn't affect the play, yet the opponent commits a facemask on the tackle. Now I'm going to penalize Team B for their foul, but not penalize Team A? In this case we should have had offsetting penalties that would most certainly affect the outcome of the play. If I didn't flag it would be very difficult to flag it after the play is done so I can make things right.

Lastly, even though the penalty may occur 40 yards from the ball, that still doesn't mean that the player won't become part of the play. What if the runner suddenly reversed direction on the field and weaved around players. Now the player that was fouled doesn't have a chance to be part of the play because of the block/hold that didn't seem to impact the play originally. Again, how do I drop the flag after the fact?

These are my reasons and though I do agree with you, I have a hard time employing this in football. I also ref basketball and I use the "no harm no foul theory" a great deal more as the play is over so much quicker.

Again...my two cents worth.

Peace!