Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor. Truman Capote
Truman Capote is the one of the last people I'd associate with football, but I'm hoping his metaphor rings true. That lessons learned during screw-ups make uncertain future success that much more satisfying.
The screw-up occurred midway through the second quarter. And screw-up does not even begin to describe the severity of this mistake. For screw-up, Roget's recommends; botch, blunder, foul up, mess up, mishandle, spoil, make a muck of. The description to harm irreparably through inept handling is pretty close.
The play itself is pretty simple. The quarterback rolls out to my left, scrambles for a bit, and then throws the ball away. Simple. Basic. And apparently easy for the officials to botch.
As soon as the football skids across the feild the White Hat throws a flag for Intentional Grounding (IG) . This didn't make any sense to me. IG occurs when the QB dumps the ball to save a loss of yardage (i.e., to prevent a sack). Clearly, this is why the QB dumped the ball on this play. However, if the QB is outside the of the normal tackle position (i.e., outside of the pocket) when the pass is thrown you have two criteria to consider before it becomes a foul.
The first is whether the ball is thrown pass the line of scrimmage (LOS). If the QB is outside the pocket and the ball crosses the LOS, then IG should NOT be called. The second is whether the QB is outside the pocket and there is a receiver with a reasonable opportunity to catch the pass. If so, then IG will also NOT be called.
During our game the QB was outside the pocket and the ball was thrown beyond the LOS. No foul. Yet we enforced a penalty for IG. This was a botch, but this is not the BOTCH I have been teasing you about.
Why did we enforce a phantom foul? The White Hat generally has no idea where the pass goes. He should be watching the QB and nothing else. If he feels the QB is throwing the ball away to avoid a sack then he tosses a flag. The protocol during these situations is the wing official hustles over to the White Hat and tells him either there was a player in the area or whether the ball crossed the LOS or not. This did not happen.
Neither did the deep official (he is the official who speaks with the coach) get the foul information and report to the coach. And finally, I didn't question the White Hat on the pass crossing the LOS. I should have asked the White Hat what was reported. This is a simple technique to save the White Hat from doing something stupid. And I knew there was no foul. I knew this was not right.
But at the time I did not have the confidence I knew the rules on IG. The White Hat is Mr. Rules. He is a Crew Chief in our High School association. He's been officiating since the 1960's. He was my college mentor last year. I trusted him. And he was wrong. It's my job as umpire to cover his ass.
I now confidently know the IG rules and will never forget them. I've seared them into my brain. So, major mistake. We penalized a team that did not foul.
But it gets worse.
The penalty for IG is five yards from the spot of the foul PLUS a loss of down. We did not enforce the loss of down. Meaning, we let them repeat the down. We gave them another down. I don't even remember what down it WAS, let alone what is was supposed to be, but this is cardinal rule #1, go straight to hell and do not collect $200 kinda botch. Know what down it is and never, never, never, EVER give a team an extra down. This is Officiating 101. It's preschool officiating.
So here is the rub; if there was no foul, then it was an incomplete pass and the down ends. If it was a IG foul then they would lose the down. Get it? Botch with a capital B.
And of course they scored two plays later. (Insert awkward silence) Good thing they lost the game.
It doesn't end here. Our entire crew was downgraded. Here is an except from the weekly bulletin "This situation is a CREW downgrade as 5 other members, within their responsibilities during penalty enforcement failed to recognize, question or communicate the loss of down situation."
Downgrading is a form of disciplinary action. Everyone at some point gets downgraded for mistakes. Even the NFL guys. But too many of these and you'll never get moved up.
Its been a week and I still cannot stop thinking about this.
