Hi Fella's....

Another official and I were discussing this the other day. He is well respected and made a good point during our debate. I thought I would bring it up here and see what people thought.

The question is, do other officials on the crew "echo" a Inadvertent Whistle? An example would be the linejudge blows an IV. The umpire hears it and now starts blowing his whistle.

What do you think?

UE

If you for sure have one, you should back it up to shut the play down quickly if the players do not stop right away. One reason is if some players slow down and let down their guard cuz they heard the whistle, and others keep going that is when guys can easily get hurt!

Usually, I don't blow a "back-up" whistle, but if I hear a whistle and see that some players hear it and some are still playing as if it hadn't been blown then I'm going to start hammering on my whistle to get the play stopped.

Moi aussi
 

I do this, but I also blow my whistle when I see a flag, even if it is not mine. I want my R/HL/Chaincrew to know that there is a flag.

I NEVER echo ANYTHING because if I did not see what had developed you might be caught in a very awkward position. Just MY thoughts.

One problem I can see is if the supposed IW came from the stands. By echoing that you now have a real IW. If an official gets on his whisle early he should hammer it loud and one whistle should be enough to get things shut down. If you do echo in, then I would make very certain the whistle you are hearing is coming from an official. He should be stopping the clock as well so that may be another sign he is blowing his whistle. But then again he may be trying to find a rock to hide under so his IW isn't all that obvious until he comes up to inform the R what happened. 4 more weeks till the new season begins.

JasonTX,

This was my point exactly. However, he was pretty adament about it.

I agree with the other comments. IF (and its a big IF), you know for sure, I suppose you could echo. But, I would only do that if a player was in danger of getting hurt or something like that.

One thing to add on, if you got players still playing, use your voice "plays over" works really well if you're afraid of the IW.

Yeah, but if there was no IW (or a whistle from the stands), and you start saying, "Play's over, play's over" without a whistle, you may be opening an even BIGGER can of worms than if you just "echo" the whistle.

If the whistle is loud enough for me to hear, than I'm assuming it's loud enough for the players to hear, therefore I'm stopping pay, I don't care if it's coming from the crowd or from the field. If there's a potential for one player to think the play's dead and stop, then the play must be stopped or else we're neglecting our duty to provide a safe environment for the players to participate in. If I hear a whistle and people keep on playing, I'm echoing it no matter what.