Didn't want to hijack the other thread... so I'm posting a new one. We had a game last week where I was U and I signaled a TD... and was told, "Good job", and "Nice Hustle". It was completely appropriate. But before I tell you why... a question:

In your mind is there ANY situation where it is appropriate for U to signal a TD.

I think there is -- on a fake or broken try for point that is run to the "open" side of the field.

The correct answer for that is "it depends." When I was working on my masters degree, one of my professors told me that you WILL NEVER GO WRONG WITH THAT ANSWER. There may be a situation where an official slips and falls or is out of position to tell one way or the other. Then, I believe that it would be ok for the U to signal TD. On our crew, we try to at least get the U to give us a thumbs up so that we know the ball carrier had possession of the ball when he broke the plane.

Umpires DO signal touchdown in Arena football.

I did once
 

Youth ball, LJ was an oldtimer ump, slow and LAZY on the wings.Dive play from about the 6, kid breaks plane, I'm saying, "he's in, he's in", look towards LJ, he's maybe at the five, I signal and he goes freaking ape-**** crazy on me.....gee thought I was helping him out????

I do not think there is any situation where you could unless you have a fumble and they see the recovery in the end zone. But as a general rule, I would not advocate having the Umpire signal TD. Because in most situations the umpire does not have the angle to decided if the knee was down or not. I think all the umpire should do is use a crew signal that helps the wings make a decision. I just see more going wrong than going right if the umpire signals a TD.

Peace

Re: I did once
 

### On a DIVE play from the 6 yardline? this kid must have had wings.

No!

I'm with Rut, U should not signal unless the LJ and HL fall down or some other crazy thing happens.

35 year ump---
once-- and in a play-off game
the ball carrier lands in the end zone
at my feet with the ball---
I look over to the wings---
no signals, nothing-----
I mutter to the closest guy "make a call dammit"
then when he looks at me like the proverbial
deer in headlights
I go up with the TD signal !!!
some officials would claim that the U
NEVER gives signals, blows whistles etc.--
I wonder what world they live in !

Umpires, whistles, touchdowns...
 

As the umpire in a 5 or 7 man crew, I try never to blow my whistle unless: I see the ball in the possession of the runner who is down near my feet between the hashmarks. When you think about it, the ball is already dead anyway.

As for touchdowns, I never signal but if I see the runner in possession of the ball over the goal line I give a thumbs-up to the wing officials (very subtle with the thumbs close to my chest and I make eye contact). We discuss this in pre-game so all the wings have to do if unsure is to look at me.

This year I did signal touchdown once in a 5 man crew. Team is lined-up to go for the extra point. They run to the vacated Line Judge's side. The line judge is hustling to get over to the sideline and the runner, blockers and several defenders arrive near the goal-line at the same time. Runner dives for the pylon and knocks it over with the ball in his possession. I look over to the line judge momentarily. No signal. Then I signal a touchdown.

We discussed afterwards and the line judge was positive the runner was not out of bounds. The referee was also trailing the play and he had a good look from behind. The linesman said he did not mind the umpire making the call because the umpire was already on the goal line and much closer to the play.

However, I prefer not to blow my whistle and make these types of calls. But its good to be prepared for them just in case.

I agree with Mike there. As U, I spit out my whistle after the snap.

Here's the bizarre play that happened last week. A's ball on B's 40, an obvious pass play - 4 man crew. Both linejudges had broken with receivers. QB gets chased out of the pocket, and then R gets buried by a trailing DL. Just as QB nears the LOS, and I'm ready to satch for him throwing while across the line, he gets leveled, ball squirts out. Ref is somewhere in a pile. B picks it up, and we all run for the endzone. I beat him there by about 5 yards, and he's tackled as he goes over the line. Thank god I was down there, because it was CLOSE.

I signal TD, and look for ref - who is at about the 30, and see HL trailing him by about 10 yards. Not sure where LJ was.

We got to talking at halftime, having a good laugh about the play (mostly giving R a hard time for getting tackled), and R says, "That's the first time in 10 years that I would say it was right for U to signal TD."

PS - Mike - on a botched FG or PAT, isn't the mechanic for LJ to assume normal U responsibilities, BJ to stay on the back line, and U to assuming "normal" LJ responsibilities?

[Edited by mcrowder on Oct 4th, 2004 at 02:37 PM]

As the U, in the pre-game the R always asks if I will signal touchdown and I always answer, "Only if the runner is handing me the ball in the endzone and the wings haven't already gone up." Sad part is it has actually happened.

I have heard of a mechanic some other boards use with the U putting his fist to his chest if he sees the runner in, in case the wings get blocked out, but we keep getting chewed on for using unofficial mechanics so generally it is not used around here.

Here's a situation :
1st and goal at the 1. QB sneaks in and gets in the endzone. U signals a TD and in the process of lifting his hands, he not only clocks the safety in the head with his hand, but the U also breaks his finger on the helmet. That's why I was told to never signal for TD if I was U.
(That would be funny to see though)

As U the only situatiuon I can see is if there is a fake or botched field goal attempt and the LJ is under the goal post.

Look First
 

Look at the LJ & HL before you do signal. It makes the entire crew look bad if one official signals TD and the LJ is running in pointing to a 'spot' outside the end zone.

See, this is good information. I worked my first game at umpire tonight, and this would have been good to know. The other two guys on the crew weren't very experienced either (one more than the other), so it's not like they would have told me.

But it's good to know. Thanks.

I've worked Umpire for 10 years now, and I've signalled touchdown FOUR times in all that time.

1) Broken PAT with no LJ on the sideline (this is why I slide to the LJ's side on PATs). (twice)

2) QB sneak from the 1, far hash from the HL in very poor lighting. QB went HL's side but was screened from HL and LJ, with me in perfect position to see the QB and ball.

3) Intercepted pass play behind the LOS in 4-man. LJ and HL are down field, R tackled with QB. I keep up with the ball and am the only one in position to signal.


For the most part, though, at Umpire I hardly ever blow my whistle (except for obvious reasons) and almost never signal TD.

I have worked U for 6 years...
 

...and in that time, I have signalled a TD only once. That happened during an fumble recovery that was recovered in the endzone. The wings were still looking at the pile and the situation was a close game. I killed it immediately with the signal.

When there is a close play at the goal line, the wings sometimes get screened by wideouts and d-backs. In obvious TD situations where my wings are screened, I take hold of my neck whistle and close my fist around it, holding it directly in front of my face. If the wing thinks he needs help, he checks to see where the whistle around my neck is and then makes the approriate call.

It's generally the only time (except for penalties) that I actually use the whistle on scrimmage plays.

This suggestion comes from one NFL umpire and one AFL-1 umpire. It keeps the crew outta some major trouble if the umpire doesn't go up when he "thinks" he has a TD.

Umpire
 

We had a play earlier in the year where on a short yardage play at the goal line a mass of about a dozen people were moving toward the goal line and all of a sudden out comes an opponent who has stolen the ball and he starts running down the field. At about the ten yard line I hear a weak whistle(I am the white hat) and then mirror the whistle to kill the play. Neither wing had a prayer of a chance of seeing the ball with the mass of bodies moving toward the goal line and neither wing knew where the ball was until the kid came running out of there with the ball going the other way towards a possible touchdown. The umpire in this case killed the play because the wing had actually started running down the field to officiate the stolen ball. The umpire was 100% sure that the kid had crossed the goal line in possesion of the ball. I like the idea of the thumbs up but in this case the wing was running down the field with the stolen ball carrier officiating the play so the thumbs up would have been redundant unless he turned completely around and signal the opposite wing. I also told the umpire that it was not a good time for a weak whistle and we had a good chuckle about that after the game!! We sold our call and went on to the extra point. We did the best we could under the conditions and did not recieve any flack except for a few fans who were just being fans! The umpire should never but....!

Re: Umpire
 

If there was a short yardage play on the goal line, how would the umpire know the runner crossed the GL with the ball, and yet the wings are unaware of it? Not that I really know of a better way of dealing with a play like this, but IMHO, the U is not a good position to rule on the GL.

I agree with Rut on this one...one of the rare times the Umpire should go up is if there is a fumble, and he digs to find a player in possession of the ball in his opponent's EZ.

How about if you're the umpire in a three-man crew? Where sometimes you could be in the umpire position behind the defense (by the book) and sometimes on the wing opposite the line judge (as some guys do it)?

I umpired for the first time Monday night in an 8th-grade game (3-man) and had to go back into the end zone on a pass to that side in the corner. Kid caught the ball in the end zone right in front of me, I had to signal TD, right?

When in a 3-man crew the umpire is essentially the U and LJ, so yes, that's your call.

In NCAA, a 3-man crew doesn't have an umpire, so I have no reference point for your question.

PSU213
 

You stated, "If there was a short yardage play on the goal line, how would the umpire know the runner crossed the GL with the ball, and yet the wings are unaware of it? Not that I really know of a better way of dealing with a play like this, but IMHO, the U is not a good position to rule on the GL."

I agree that the umpire is not in a good position to make the call but in this case he was the only one who could make the call and was lucky because it was a no brainer for him to see the ball had in fact crossed the end zone. So how did know it crossed the line, he said, "I saw it had crossed the line." For me that's all I need to know because no one else could see that under the circumstances and I would not doubt his judgement until someone else could show me different. Never say never but when the going gets tough cream rises to the top and in this case other than the weak whistle my umpire rose to the top and I respect him for that. He was there when our crew needed him the most and that is the kind of official I want on my crew. My philosophy on officiating is I don't care how we get there as long as we get it right.

In our area (NE Wisconsin), 7th grade and 8th grade games are typically the only 3-man crew (or the occasional Freshman game where the white hat goes to the wrong school ;) ). Those are the only games in which I have signaled TD when Ump. Especially the plays to the opposite side of the linesman. Everything else I leave up to someone else.

Wow, wish that were the case here in NE North Dakota, but unfortunately we often are forced to do 7th & 8th grade games solo as we don't have enough officials to field even 2-man crews for sub-high school games.

With this in mind, how do others go about recruiting officials? I have tried in the past to get graduating seniors for the following season, coworkers and even fraternity borthers, but they all bow out because of:

1) Times are inconvenient
2) Equipment is too expensive
3) Pay isn't enough to compensate for time lost at work

Believe it or not, we're working a varsity reserve game in the Madison area with 3-officials on Saturday morning. It's all the school will pay for. Normally I'll bring 5 if they'll pay for 4 and we'll split 4 checks, but when they only pay for 3 at $35/per they get 3.

--Rich

Believe it or not, we're working a varsity reserve game in the Madison area with 3-officials on Saturday morning. It's all the school will pay for. Normally I'll bring 5 if they'll pay for 4 and we'll split 4 checks, but when they only pay for 3 at $35/per they get 3.

--Rich [/B][/QUOTE]


This is cheating the kids. No way can a three man crew see all that's needed to be seen in a varsity game. Too bad. Are you going three man "by the book" or having a R, HL and LJ?

I agree, I don't think I'd be very comfortable doing a 3 man game for a varsity contest.

Sometimes you have to. The year before I joined my current crew they worked a 4-man game. Some time in the first half the LJ had his leg broken during a play. (No this wasn't a mafia game :D) They had to work the rest of the game as a 3-man crew. You might not want to do it but you'd better be ready for it if it happens.

I understand that you may have to finish a game with fewer officials, but for a school to say "we'll only pay for three officials to work our varsity game" that's a little too stingy in my book. I know public schools have money problems these days, but come on, I doubt they'll balance the budget on the backs of the zebras!

Re: I did once
 

The wings should be moving to the goal line right after the snap. On balls snapped inside the 10, the wings go to the goal linea and the BJ has the endline. This is a coverage mistake.

This is cheating the kids. No way can a three man crew see all that's needed to be seen in a varsity game. Too bad. Are you going three man "by the book" or having a R, HL and LJ? [/B][/QUOTE]

Read closer. It's a varsity RESERVE game. the bigger schools play VR and JV here.

My preference is to work without an umpire and have the referee watch the line play closer. Since I'm the referee that's what we'll likely do.

In WI it is REQUIRED to have at least 4 in a varsity game, with 5 strongly recommended.

--Rich

That's interesting. I've never heard of that before. Anybody else on the board doing that?

Totally agree with Mike and Crowder! I do prefer the pointing down signal however since it is a completely undefined signal to the sidelines and fans AND announcers. It relays a clear signal to the crew and yet gives nothing to anyone else. A thumbs up might indicate "I have a touchdown" to a coach, but pointing down only indicates that I can see the ball down. The explanation to the coach is that yes, the Umpire saw the ball down but it's still the flank's call as they have the best perspective relative to the ball and the goal line.

This is hilarious because here in Canada, the U has no restrictions on what he can/should do/not do.

The U in a Cdn totally has the ability to judge forward progress.

What is it that causes this fundamental difference? Field size?