Reporting Penalties

[Rich]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

* The HL must know that the LS is past the halfway point along the chains.

Our linesman always lets me know whether "five will get you one" or not when the box is close to the tape on the chain. It's routine for us and should be for all crews. Our linesman measures the chains for every game at every level and always puts fresh tape on the chain.

The only time I've ever wondered if there was a good way to use the chains to measure was when we had a PF on a play that ended just about 15 yards short of a first down. In the end I eyed it up and it appeared to get the first down by about half-a-yard and that's the way we rolled with it (although in the back of my head I wondered if everyone simply thought we enforced it as an AFD).

I don't have a strict reporting requirement for my crew -- I have preferences, though -- I really prefer they say "offense" or "defense" or "kicking team" or "receivers." I'm not fond of shirt colors. Personally, I don't care if I get a shirt number, although it's part of the sequence so we can get the number to the sideline. If the official doesn't have a number, but has a position, that's OK. Saying left tackle to me is better than giving the wrong number. Like Jeff said, if a hand comes up and twists a face mask and we don't get a number, it doesn't really bother me -- it's not like not getting the number doesn't mean the foul didn't exist.

I also prefer holding and DPI to be described (arm bar, hook and turn, tackle, bear hug) so we can take that information to the sideline.