If only....

[OverAndBack]

In the midst of this pretty sad story, I was intrigued by this:

Reports from the previous week's game and about the upcoming teams are reviewed. A rules test also is administered.

A devotional breakfast and another meeting precedes Sunday's kickoff. Afterward, all officials are given a DVD of the game to review on their way home. Another DVD follows Tuesday featuring select plays teams submitted from coaching tapes that provide different camera angles on questionable rulings. A graded report from Pereira's office follows Wednesday. Officials also must complete a weekly 100-question take-home test and maintain the physical fitness needed to cover the field.

My God, do you know how much better we' d be (us high school officials) if we could see DVDs of all of our games and have multiple replays and a graded report by someone whose job it was to do that?

I fully realize that no state has the resources to make that happen, nor do we probably have the time to take in all that feedback. I was just thinking, "Man, we would be so much better prepared and effective if we had just 1/10th of that."

[HLin NC]

Yup-we beg coaches for film or a DVD. Few are cooperative, some are indifferent, and there are those that think we want to analyze something they might be doing illegally and flat out refuse.

I quit bringing blank VHS tapes and mailers years ago because they didn't come back.

I've mentioned writing something into our next contracts with the schools. Several heads nod but nothing beyond that. Like everything else here, it wouldn't happen unless the state mandated it.

[bisonlj]

Originally Posted by HLin NC

Yup-we beg coaches for film or a DVD. Few are cooperative, some are indifferent, and there are those that think we want to analyze something they might be doing illegally and flat out refuse.

I quit bringing blank VHS tapes and mailers years ago because they didn't come back.

I've mentioned writing something into our next contracts with the schools. Several heads nod but nothing beyond that. Like everything else here, it wouldn't happen unless the state mandated it.

We still get tapes on about 30% of our games but they aren't always helpful. The camera only follows the ball (and sometimes not so well) and the quality is so grainy it's hard to see specifics. It is also so far back that you can't clearly holding in the middle of the line or something in front of the runner. They also only show snap to end of down so you miss anything that happens between plays. My favorite though is hearing comments by the cameraman or others around him. I wonder if they realize we sometimes get copies.

[MadCityRef]

We ask, we get.
Had a coach this year send both an EZ view and the sideline view (digital!!) to show us the numerous illegal blocks we missed. Went frame by frame in both views and saw one. Guess that block was worth the 22-point margin of defeat.

Have had coaches refuse until season over so we don't share their secrets with other teams. Why are football coaches so paranoid.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by MadCityRef

We ask, we get.
Had a coach this year send both an EZ view and the sideline view (digital!!) to show us the numerous illegal blocks we missed. Went frame by frame in both views and saw one. Guess that block was worth the 22-point margin of defeat.

Have had coaches refuse until season over so we don't share their secrets with other teams. Why are football coaches so paranoid.

It's in the job description. Look in the dictionary under "rat."

[Reffing Rev.]

The very first association I was a part of did have film of every game worked by the 4 crews we had, and we did review them at least bi-weekly. We took a camera man with us and our own video equipment, and with a little training actually got great officiating films. Sons and fathers of crewmates make good cameramen. And that was the best association I have ever been a part of.

[OverAndBack]

THAT would be righteous.

I have a 14-year-old, maybe I can train him.

[davedoc]

In my bag I keep at least one blank recordable DVD within a self addressed padded envelope. If I see someone recording the game, on the field or up in the press box, I will ask them if they will burn a copy for me. It costs me about $2 per for the DVD, package and postage.

It's that simple. This year I was able to hand out 4 DVD's. All but one of them was useful since the guy kept stopping and starting the camera.

[jjrye22]

We also tried to get tape of the games from the coaches - usually didn't get anything, and when we did it was snap to end of play, almost always focusing exclusively on where the ball was.

My association started seding someone to tape some games - and basically tape 5/6 plays focusing on one offical, than on another. Not really so much on the play on the field, as the movements and mecahnics of the officials.
I haven't seen very much of the result yet - it will be used this winter in our training, and to produce some training tapes for the new guys.

I love looking at tape of myself - I can always find things I would have liked to have changed or done better...

James

[OverAndBack]

I have been able to get DVDs/VHS from a couple of schools just by asking the AD and explaining that it would be a useful training tool for our association.

I've put a couple of the clips on YouTube. If I can get my video capture card to work again, I'll do some more.

[wisref2]

I've been bringing tapes with a self-addressed stamped envelope to nearly every game for three years. We get back about 80% of them. Sometimes they include a note - mostly positive - and sometimes they point out a play. When they do that, I always respond to the coach apologizing for a bad call and telling him what we did to learn from it.

[Forksref]

Coaches are paronoid because they want to win, yet they can't control everything that happens, whether it be their players actions or the officials. So...it's easier to look at the officials as the cause of the losses.

We had one coach at half-time imply that we were racist. Yikes, his team was the most disorganized and poorly coached. His team got a bunch of encroachment penalties because they couldn't even line up correctly. Sad, because his players were great kids. They got blown out but still, after the game, some of the players wanted to shake our hands. One of the players during the game said to us, "We don't have any coaches." If they did, they'd have been a competitive team. I applaud the kids for having a good attitude and having fun out there.