A full schedule

My first season as a full staff member at the college level is a full schedule - eleven games. This is very good news since the typical schedule averages eight-nine games.

I have a bye week 9/20, but I have two games on 9/13. The first is at 1:00 and the second is at 7:00. Since we have to be dressed and ready two hours before game time, and the first game is sixty miles away, my day will begin at 9:30AM and not end until about 10:30PM. The first game will end around 4:30 and then I rush to the second game. The good news is the second game is on the way home, but still a forty mile drive. Good thing I have the same White Hat for both games, so the games can't start without him. Still, a thirteen hour day.

For the eleven games , the total number of miles I'll be on the road is 1,540. I have two games with round trips greater than 250 miles with the longest being 310 miles. I can't complain too much about 310 miles because the Side Judge has a 494 mile round trip. I believe these are considered 'travel' games and they will pay for us to spend the night.

As far as White Hat's go this season is very different than last year. Last year I may have had the same White Hat only once. This season I have four games with Frank, three with Jim, two with Milt, and one with Jerry. Frank, Jim, and Milt are from my local college group as well as officials in my High School group. Milt was my High School Crew Chief for a period of time.

Scrimmages begin this Saturday, but as usual, there is some drama. As usual, the college scrimmages conflict with the High School clinic. I just got an email today saying we have two college scrimmages at 11:00. How are we supposed to do that and participate in the High School clinic?

Planning to Plan

It's August 2nd and I have not received my college schedule. The coordinator sent us an email stating the system that schedules the games either was not working or had inaccurate information.

The email was broken out by position and it looks like eight of the Umpires are not available most of the weeks. We have twenty-two Umpires and sixteen games per week, so this should mean I'll get a full schedule this season. Last season I worked eight out of twelve games... which wasn't bad for a Candidate.

It also appears from the what he sent that many of my fellow officials are also working other conferences. This is good news. During our clinics, camps, and other meetings, we are repeatedly told the CCFOA is good recruiting ground for the other conferences. The fact there are scheduling conflicts confirms this is true.

Monday night beings my high school football meetings. I really hate going to these meetings. They are not well run and a lot of time is wasted. Plus there are ten meetings this year. I'm already going to miss one meeting because I have to travel for work.

I understand we need a certian amount of training ohurs each season to qualify... fine, but could we either make the meetings longer, so there are fewer of them, or just get them all over with in one week? I don't mind putting the time to study and prepare. Hell, I'm doing football all year now and constantly study, but I can't promise I will make ten Monday nights in a row.

My business trip will be later this month and will conflict with a meeting on 8/26. I'm sure this will be 'mandatory' meeting where we turn in our tests and if I don't attend I won't get playoff games again.

On another note, I made a request to the HS coordinator that I'd like to be considered for the next Varsity White Hat position. There are two White Hats that will retire very soon and three of the existing White Hats have stated I'm ready.

The coordinator has not replied.