A-11 Offense ??

[JugglingReferee]

Originally Posted by Texas Aggie

First of all, most officials call what's there. They don't seek more control or want more penalties. Most of them, in fact, want fewer. The game gets over faster. Plus, the crews that get the best schedules around here are the ones that have the fewest penalties (and they all know that). So you couldn't be more wrong on this point.

Second, we don't want any more officials out on the field or court than is necessary to do our job. I don't want more than 3 officials in basketball nor more than 7 in football (5 in subvarsity). So, you're wrong here as well.

I love it when people that know nothing about officiating start talking about what officials want.

Agreed with everything, except for the bold statement. While preventative officiating is desired, and even stressed here in Canada, and can be used for reducing the number of penalties, I prefer that quality flags be thrown, rather than a low quantity of flags be thrown. For quality officials, it is rare to have a large number of flags because they effectively use other tools during the game.