Responding to sideline / bleacher chatter

[Kirby]

Originally Posted by Bullycon

I'm a second year official myself. I've never held back from throwing a flag because of someone yelling for it. In fact, I've sometimes even found it helpful. I've found in my second year one of my biggest problems on the field is not having the confidence to throw the flag. Sometimes, a coach or fan yelling is enough to trigger me into thinking, "Yes, that was a foul. Yes, I do need to throw the flag." Other times, a flag from another official is a trigger.

Be careful here. "Me too" or "Copycat" flags do not look good and are usually transparent and can make the crew look bad. That is, if the first official was wrong, now we are both wrong because of the "me too" flag.

Call what you see and don't let outside factors influence you. If you have a foul, throw the flag after all necessary considerations (point-of-attack, advantage/disadvantage, etc). If another official happens to throw the flag for the same foul, that is great, but you never need to see his flag to throw yours.

If you think there was a foul but are not 110% sure, don't throw the flag. Phantom flags are worse than not throwing the flag at all.

Also, coaches and fans are biased. All contact is DPI if they are on offense or OPI if they are on defense. They are the last people who should ever influence whether or not we throw the flag.

[Bullycon]

Originally Posted by Kirby

Be careful here. "Me too" or "Copycat" flags do not look good and are usually transparent and can make the crew look bad. That is, if the first official was wrong, now we are both wrong because of the "me too" flag.

Call what you see and don't let outside factors influence you. If you have a foul, throw the flag after all necessary considerations (point-of-attack, advantage/disadvantage, etc). If another official happens to throw the flag for the same foul, that is great, but you never need to see his flag to throw yours.

I agree with everything you say. It's not something that happens often. I can only think of three examples this season.

One was a DPI call that I was late on, not dropping my flag until I saw the back judge's. I don't know if anyone noticed other than me. The white hat did not say anything about it. He came up to the two of us and said, "Let me guess. Defense pass interference? Yeah, I could've called that one from the backfield." He's the instructor for new officials, so I think he would've said something had he noticed.

A second was a hold. This one was rather quick. The coach yelled for holding, and the holding was still happening when I threw the flag. So it was probably unnoticed, as well. Mostly, I look back on the play and wonder if the coach hadn't have yelled, would I have threw the flag? I'm 100% sure I should have, but I'm not 100% sure I would have. And that is bothersome.

The third play was another DPI call that I did not flag. The defender made contact, the ball fell incomplete, then I heard the coach yelling for DPI, then I saw the referee's flag come in. In this case, I did not drop my flag. I figured I looked bad enough as it was. I was very happy to see the referee's flag, and frustrated with myself that I had not dropped mine.

If you think there was a foul but are not 110% sure, don't throw the flag. Phantom flags are worse than not throwing the flag at all.

I had a play two Saturdays ago in which I was 95% sure that a face mask had been grabbed. But another player blocked my view and I could not see the player's face mask. By the time the player had moved and my line of sight restored, the face mask had been released. I did not drop the flag. Fortunately, the referee had an unblocked view and threw his flag. Right decision on my part?

Also, coaches and fans are biased. All contact is DPI if they are on offense or OPI if they are on defense. They are the last people who should ever influence whether or not we throw the flag.

I don't mean to imply that I let anyone sway me when there is a question of whether it was a foul. I don't throw the flag unless I believe it was a foul. It's just there seems to be a disconnect sometimes between seeing the foul and flagging the foul. It's something I'm working on.