A foul is a foul when the official calls it......

I spent most of my time this weekend camping and white water rafting.   However, the night before I headed up, I was sleeping over a friend's place and brought along some reading material in the form of "Referee" magazine.

There was an interesting article on "intentional fouls" and how the application of the rule these days stray far from the actual written rule these days.

That article got me to think about a few things involving basketball officiating and regular personal fouls.  One of the annoyances I have with officiating is with parents (youth level) and players (adult leagues) that cry about fouls that WEREN'T called.  Not to pick on the parents or adult league players as high school and college coaches will whine too.  However, they are generally better informed about the game than parents and adult league players.

When it comes to officiating basketball, calling fouls is very subjective.  The basic definition of a personal fouls is that a player cannot impede the normal offensive or defensive movements of an opposing player.

However, officials usually apply this rule with the philosophy of advantage / disadvantage.  Did a player gain any advantage by performing some action (holding, hand checking, etc, etc)?  If the answer is YES, then the official will blow the whistle and call the foul.  If the answer is NO, then the play will go on.

That is why my subject line says:  A foul is a foul when the official calls it


I am not saying that officials are perfect.  We WILL miss some fouls that should have been called.   However, everyone needs to give the officials more credit.  If you felt that a foul should have been called but it wasn't, then give the official the benefit of the doubt.  They probably had a good reason for not blowing the whistle.

Rather than arguing about it, you should quietly talk to the official during a time out and see what they say about the situation.  Arguing about a non-call is generally non-productive.  Officials will not go back and suddenly change their non-call.  Plus, this could lead to a technical foul if things go too far.  

Just some things to keep in mind from the perspective of an official.

Taking Time Off Mentally

I love to officiate basketball.  Despite not officiating much recently, I have to admit there's a great rush when you officiate a great basketball game.

On the other hand, there's a reason why I take time off.   I don't know if it's my personality, but I find it a mental strain to work so many games constantly.  I don't think I have thin skin but perhaps I am more emotional than other officials.

There are some fellow officials I know who can easily officiate 4 to 5 days a week for almost the entire year.  There is enough basketball games between youth, AAU, high school and adult leagues/tournaments if want it.

For me, my busiest time is between November and May.  I work high school game constantly during that time as well youth and adult leagues/tournaments.  However, once May ends and the season ends, I go into hibernation a bit.  I still officiate every now and then but don't take as many games.  I really enjoy the downtime away from officiating.  

I compare the downtime to taking a vacation from your regular job.  Many people work years without taking a vacation.  However, as a few of my friends told me,  when you take a vacation from work, you realize how much stress you go through on a day to day basis.   Vacation allows you to get away and forget about work (at least for a short while).

So while I did work a bit the last few days, I have enjoyed my time away from officiating.  In about a month or so, youth volleyball is going to start up and I'll probably be involved.  Then before you know it, high school basketball is coming around the corner.

Been a while.......

I'm still here but after running into some work issues the past few months, I haven't officiated that much. I did work the past couple of weekends and got in some good games but otherwise laying low. As weird it sounds, my passion for officiating has cooled a bit in wake of my work issues.

I'm not sure if it's due to the stress at work or just tired of the noise that accompanies officiating. Generally, I can put it aside pretty easily, but lately I've been tired of it. So all in now, I will officiate every now and then but otherwise, lay low to recharge my batteries and rest up mentally.

Some coaches have no clue........

I got a chance to officiate a youth basketball tournament today (I believe it was considered an AAU tournament). This was some of the items my partner and I observed and/or had to deal with:

#1

In the second game of the day, one team (Red) was just crushing their opponent (Black). Red was using their press defense from the get go and Black was not good enough to handle it. At halftime, the score was something like 31-3. One would think the Red coach would stop pressing and work on something things.

Nope. The Red team kept pressing and the final score was 68-8. A parent from another team that was playing in the next game talked to one of the Red team's assistant coaches about the matter. The parent was told the Red team was prepping for another tournament they were playing in. If Red was indeed prepping, then they have a lot to work on. Their press was sloppy with kids gambling on steals and getting beat. When the kids did get steals, they took quick shots and otherwise did not play fundamental basketball. A better team would have eaten them alive.

#2

In a game between teams I will simply call White and Black, my partner and I had to deal with unruly coaches. Minutes into the game, a White assistant coach was complaining that I missed an out of bounds call. I simply told the assistant coach that I didn't particularly care about what he thought as I saw what I saw. The White assistant coach started complaining even more after that so I told the head coach to calm his assistant down and issued a warning.

On the other hand, the Black team coaches were equally annoying. My partner and I were forced to call several fouls on one of the Black team players. These were legitimate fouls but the head coach was like "You called 4 fouls on one player, what's up with that?" Then he went on to ask me "Did you see what happened yesterday?"

My answer to the Black head coach was "The four fouls were all legitimate. I was not here yesterday so I don't know what happened but it doesn't apply to today's game anyway". Afterward, the assistant coaches for Black started getting into it and I issued a warning to the Black team as well. Three technicals later, I guess the Black team didn't quite listen to us.

All in all, it was an interesting day officiating. It's fine if coaches want to ask questions but these youth coaches sometimes have no idea of what they are saying or doing. I have minimal patience for these coaches.

Getting back into the grove....

I haven't officiated much recently. I've kept to working some weekend kid's game but have avoided other games. The reason is that I've had to focus on my job. When I leave the office, I mentally want to take some time off instead of trying to officiate games.

That being said, I'll be getting back to officiating a little more the next couple of weeks. I'll post more next week.

The passing of Ben Legere - SF CYO loses an original

Several weeks ago, I attended a SF CYO 7th grade boys basketball championship game in which my old grammar school was playing. When I showed up to the gym, I was happy to see that I knew the two officials working the game. One of them was longtime (50+ years) CYO referee and Hall of Famer Ben Legere.

I usually officiate with Ben a few times a season during the boys basketball season. However, due to work, my high school season and other things, I hadn't worked many CYO boys games and thus didn't work with Ben at all this season.

During halftime, I went downstairs to the court to say hi to Ben and the other official. Ben was happy to see me and we chatted a bit. Ben had always been a little quirky and had seem bitter and withdrawn the last few years I had seen him. On this day though, Ben seemed much more relaxed and happy than I remembered him from a couple of years ago.

It was during that day that I found out a local TV station had interviewed Ben and produced a short story on Ben which aired later that evening. The story can be seen here:

KPIX Story on Ben Legere

Unfortunately, these two particular memories will be my last ones for Ben Legere. After umpiring a baseball game in San Bruno on Wednesday, Ben collapsed while taking the bus home and passed away. He was 77 years old.

My first experience with Ben was back in 1987 when I played my first ever CYO basketball in 8th grade (my school did not have sports teams until that year). He officiated our first ever game in which we lost 35-28. I don't recall if he officiated any of our other games during my 8th grade year.

After I moved on to high school, I returned to coach at my school and saw Ben around but didn't interact with him a lot. It wasn't until 1993 when I began officiating in CYO that I started to interact with him more.

Like I said before, Ben could be quirky as an official but he had good knowledge and was always willing to share his views. You only had to listen to him. I know many officials found Ben frustrating at time to deal with and I could see why.

On the other hand, Ben had dedicated his life to CYO and youth athletics. He was unmarried and lived a solitary life. Even though he could be difficult to deal with at times, I overlooked that because I felt like he sometimes just wanted people to talk to. As my friends will tell you, I am a very patient listener and gave my time when I could.

As I look back, I am thankful that Ben was always giving me advice on my officiating and he was instrumental in helping me mature. Tomorrow night will be my first week of officiating CYO girls basketball as I missed the previous week. I think it will be an emotional night because it will be the first time in my 17 years of officiating that Ben Legere is not with us.

CYO has lost one of it's originals but heaven has gained one heck of a person. Rest in Peace Ben. You've been a part of many people's lives for years and your influence will be felt for many years to come.

All Officials hope for is.............

A COMPETITIVE GAME!

Well, maybe we hope for a little more than too. However, a competitive game is probably among the top 3 items that officials want. After all, a competitive game keeps the teams, fans and officials engaged. To be perfectly honest, nothing beats being an official in a competitive game with a lot of screaming fans (unless you're a player in the same game!)

That being said, I had a great night tonight. I worked two 6th grade boys youth basketball league championship games. Both games came down to the the final possession with the first game ending in a 30-29 score and the second game ending at 31-28.

What made the experience even more intense was that the games were held at a very small facility with a court that is lightly smaller than the standard high school court. Also, the seating was very limited so fans were lined up all along the walls.

I love these kind of games because I just tune out everyone (even if the fans are screaming next to me) and focus on the game. I worked with two good parters and had a good time. I wish we could have this kind of experience every game but that's a pipe dream.

My youth league boys season ends after tonight and now I wait for a couple of weeks for the girls season. Not a bad way to end it tonight!