We screwed this one up.....

[AtlUmpSteve]

Personally, I verbalize "NOOOO!!" in that case; definitely NOT "no catch", just "NO".

But the issue isn't if your partner knew you ruled "no catch"; he admitted he just blew the result of the following play. It MAY be questionable if the teams knew, not sure if there were tag attempts from your description.

But, other than a possible issue of how quickly you called time, in case there may have been another play that wouldn't be with jeopardy attached, you needed to review the obvious misapplication that needed to be changed. Some may believe you should wait for a coach to appeal the call; I believe that your action was appropriate under these circumstances, as the coaches look to us address the obvious situations.

IMO, by addressing it yourself, immediately, you created (or expanded) a "trust" factor with those two teams, that your games will be handled correctly. That has value, even well beyond the normal expectation that if they appeal/protest/complain that you will rule correctly.

I recently had a play in a D1 game, first of a 3 game series, where one of my (3 man) crew made an award on a ball out of play that I believed incorrect. As PU, I called the crew together without waiting for it to be challenged, we talked it out and got it right. After the game, I found out BOTH head coaches called the conference coordinator to THANK him and give praise for this crew working to "get it right" without the need for them to challenge us. The rest of weekend was calm and cordial, and a later assignment with that home school was more of that, the coaches trusting us to handle whatever. My belief is that we should do more of that when it is clearly a rule misapplication; I'm NOT suggesting we approach our partners about judgment.