Missing tailbone pad puts team in the playoffs

[sloth]

Originally Posted by waltjp

This is a garbage statement. We're officials and we're out there to enforce the rules, not to invoke our sense of fairness. Sometimes you have to make the game impacting call. Sometimes you have to enforce a rule that impacts the game. If you're not willing to make the call or enforce the rule that will impact the game you may as well stay home because you're not doing your job.

So your going to tell me that you call every rule in the book, every play...no exceptions? We warn players all the time about stuff. How many times do we over look holding or a BIB that is not severe or at the point of attack? So as a referee, had the coach not noticed the missing tailpad and you had,would you have hit him for a 15 yard USC? If not, then the coach just talked you into a call you would not have made otherwise.

I've been starting to dabble in DIII JV games. I've taken a lot of great high level concepts from the meetings I've been to. One of them is "not to be a pioneer"-don't look for inventive ways to enforce the rules. Another is "make the foul matter if your going to enforce if it's in a close game"...in other words don't be too technical in close games. Yes, we may impact the outcome of a game, but it has to matter to the game.

The equipment rules are there to insure the safety of the players. If the coach notices that a piece of equipment is missing, you should thank him for his attention to detail, stop the game to fix the problem then play on. The absence of a tailpad didn't give one team an advantage over the other...why have a game decidd because an official decided that he was going to lay down the law and mak an example of a situation.

At the end of the day, I'd rather be known as the offical that used good prudent judgement it that situation to address an issue in a non-impactful way as opposed to an official that knocked a team out of field goal range because of a missing tailbone pad. I'd venture a guess that 9 out of 10 coaches would agree that is the proper way to handle this foul.