Any Advice For A Rookie?

[ForensicRef]

Originally Posted by waltjp

This has to rate as about the worst advice anyone can offer you. It's better to be slow and correct than fast and wrong. An NFL official who helps our association with mechanics suggests that we try to officiate a scrimmage without using whistles. His claim is that after the first couple of plays the players will become accustomed to it and the officiating crew will realize that the whistles are not really required.


See wrist lanyard here.

I think I can accomplish the wrist landyard with my regular one. I'll just move the black ball up and lock it around my wrist and wrap the rest of the string around my hand.

What about the old saying that you "play until you hear the whistle"? Isn't that what the players are taught? I hear a lot from the guys teaching the class that "sometimes I never blow my whistle" and "the play is dead by rule." I think what might happen sometimes is that we're so afraid of blowing an inadvertant whistle that we over compensate by not blowing it at all. If the play is dead by rule, and you know it's dead by rule, there should be nothing wrong with blowing the whistle, but I agree with everyone here that having it in your mouth is probably a bad idea. I had to catch myself a couple times before I blew it to make sure I was sure that the play was actually dead.

[waltjp]

Originally Posted by ForensicRef

What about the old saying that you "play until you hear the whistle"? Isn't that what the players are taught?

You'll hear this from coaches and parents. Like a lot of things you'll hear from them - it's not true.

I can almost guarantee that at some point this season there will be a play that is clearly over, a whistle won't be blown and a player will unload on an opponent. Flags will fly for the late hit and soon after you'll hear the chorus sing, "The whistle didn't blow."

Whistle or not, the play is over when the play is over.