When the right thing is not the correct thing

Last year I officiated the best game of my football career. And I hardly remember anything except one play late in the second quarter. It changed my entire perspective on the role of the White Hat.

This was the last freshman game of the 2006 season and I was the White Hat for the cross-town rival game. Before the game, both coaches explained this game was for the league championship and was very important to both teams. I told the coach that was great and we all agreed we'd "let the boys play" tonight. All was well.

And it was well. This was a classic game. The air was cold, fog hanged in the air, the crowd was into the game, and the play was awesome. Both teams fought hard and the game went back and forth. I truly was a beautiful thing. Then it happened.

Somewhere around 3:00 minutes left in the 2nd quarter there was a sweep to the right sideline that went about 15 yards past the LOS. There was one hell of a late hit that the Line Judge correctly called. If a late hit in a rivalry game is not bad enough, the players ended-up on top of one the coaches. The twist is this coach happens to have no legs, no arms, and is in a wheelchair.

So I have big ass collision with a flag, in a big game, in front of God and Country, with a person in the coaches box who happens to be in a wheelchair. You can imagine what was going through my mind.

Thank goodness no one was hurt. After administrating the penalty, we resumed play. A play or two later, my Back Judge ran the ball back after a pass and asked 'are you going to let the coach stay in the box. Isn't this unsafe." Ahhhh, ya.

For the next series of plays I must admit I was not thinking about the game. I was thinking about that Bobby Martin kid from Dayton who had no legs and the officials in that game would not let him play. Those guys were scorned as villains. Ya, I want to go down that road.

But what I finally decided was to wait until half-time so I didn;t make a scene and I asked the coach if he minded remaining behind the coaches box rather then being in it. I said I felt with all the players surrounding him, he was not able to move out of the way quickly enough should another play occur near him. Thankfully, he understood and agreed.

I cannot find anything in the rules stating this coach could not be in the coaches box. All I found was rule 1-1-6. I know I did the 'right' thing because had there been a 2nd incident and a player was really hurt, I think I opened myself up to some serious safety negligence allegations. But the 'correct' thing is to do nothing because he has a right to be the box as a coach.

At the end of the game both coaches agreed this was one of the best games they had ever been apart of and thanked me for a well officiated game.

Don't ask me who won. That was the last thing on my mind.

Scrimmges 'R Us

Saturday is both college scrimmage day and one of the HS scrimmage days. I'm required to do both in order to work games. Luckily, our college regional rep is also part of our association (and my former HS crew chief) and he was able to negotiate a deal with the HS head guy. But we still need to work and hour at the HS scrimmage, then run over to the college scrimmage, then back to the HS scrimmages. Next Sat will be the same thing. What a pain.

I did get the schedule for the first half of the college season - three games. I don't work the first two weeks. I guess this is ok since we were really only promised four games for the season. I get the last 5 weeks of the season in 10 days or so. If I get 6 games for the season I'll be ok with it. Since I work primarily at Umpire, I should be happy with what I got. There are 22 umpires and 17 games per week. Getting 3 games is pretty good I guess.

Next year I'll have to push to work the wings.

Stop Asking Stupid Questions

Let' see, it's 11:15PM on a Saturday night and I'm blogging. Yea, I know. The kid are finally asleep... so is the wife. I guess I can finish the 2nd of three HS football test.

I'm not sure about your association, but mine uses open books now. But we have three, 100 question tests, so its not like you can just slack off. Some questions are straight out of the rule book, others are from the case book, and others are well crafted and force you to look in several places in the rules. An example would be a play scenario where you have to account for which teams was last in possession, who had "clean hands", dead-ball fouls on plays with a double foul, with PSK involved. Or something like that.

But as I mentioned last time, some of these questions are just not well thought out. For example, one of the questions on this years test is "A PSK foul can only occur after the kick crosses the line of scrimmage." I hate these kind of questions. Follow me on this.

First, the foul occurs when and where the foul occurs. PSK is simply an enforcement spot for a foul that occurs under certain conditions during a Scrimmage kick down. In Rule 2-16-2-h PSK requires a foul by "B", during a scrimmage kick plan (and here is my point) in which the ball crosses the expanded neutral zone.

So, to cross the expanded neutral zone also means the must cross the line of scrimmage. But, what does the question designer on my association test want? If you take the literal description out the manual, then the question is false. If you read it like someone who 'thinks', then the answer is true. The kick cannot cross the expanded neutral zone with out first crossing the LOS. So, yea a PSK foul can only occur after the ball crosses the LOS... duh.

But I still think it is a trick question and the answer is false because... well I really don't know why. A better question would have been "When K commits a foul behind the LOS the enforcement spot is the PSK spot". At least this version really tests you knowledge on what a PSK foul is and when it occurs.

But whatever. I know what to do when it happens in a game. I wouldn't care so much, but you have to get a score of 90+ in order to work post season and there are always about ten of these bullshit type questions. Or they use double negatives. Those really suck too.

College scrimmage start next week, but do I know when and where... no.

Change is good, right?

Just returned from the HS football meeting. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I expected to be moved to another crew. Unfortunately, I was.

Being on a crew is akin to being on a team. That's a really nice cliche, but not really true... it is more like being in a click. We have our table at the meetings, our own inside jokes, our own countless stories about games where 'this' or 'that' happened, and we want the whole thing to be exclusive. There are people we never want to work with, and lets be honest, don't deserve to be on our crew. Our crew ROCKS and we know it. And I will miss working with those guys.

But, we all knew this day was going to come. We do actually have the highest rated crew in the association. All five of us work at least 1st or 2nd round of playoffs each year. Most of the other crews are really hurting for experienced people. We need to do what is best for the association.

From what I was told, my new crew chief asked for help and my name was the first to come-up. I'll assume this was a complement.

My new crew chief, I am told, is a good guy and runs a good game. Its odd, but in 11 years with the association, I have never actually worked any games with him. When I asked where he planned on using me, he said that was up to me. Now, that has never happened before. Either I am highly respected and thus, can get whatever I want, or this crew is weak all around and anywhere I work will make things better. I prefer to think the former, but I expect it is the later.

Completed the first of three open book test. I have another gripe session next time on some of the annoying questions that are asked on the NFHS test.

Policies

Spent the last several days on airplanes so no time to blog. But, I spent a lot of time studying the rules for both HS and College. I've reached that place where I've spent too much time in the books and need to get back on the field.

Okay, here is my bitch this week - scheduling meetings. With all due respect for my association coordinator, the guy needs to understand how the other half lives. Many of the members of the association are school teachers, police officers, construction workers, etc. Essentially 8-5 kind of guys. I am not. I am a 'white collar' worker who is on call 24/7. I have to make arrangements with my boss to not be accessible during football games. I'm lucky to have a boss who is understanding and supports me, but since I am in management, I have a burden to my employer to ensure my area is covered (I am an IT manager).

So, I get this note from my crew chief stating there are no excused absences for meetings and the association has a minimum number of pre-season training hours. Well, this trip was planned and paid for since March. We were only told three weeks ago about the pre-season meeting schedule. How can missing the meeting be held against me? In the 11 years I've been part of the association, we have never met in July. In fact, in 11 years I've never missed a meeting. Further, I attend all the voluntary summer study meetings, worked the All-Star game I previously blogged about, and even worked a semi-pro game in June. I've put in the time and paid my dues. Literally ($75) and figuratively.

Our association complains about not having enough officials. Well, there needs to be some flexibility. It's one thing if I just didn't attend the meeting because I forgot or was lazy. There needs to be credit for my summer meetings or something.

The next meeting is Monday, so I'll see what this means. Maybe I won't get playoffs this year. That would be unfair and disappointing, but not the end of the world.

Are you a white collar working like me? What hoops do you have to go through?

The Ugly Side of the Game

Last month I was asked to work the so-called County All-Star game. I've worked several of these contest in the past and each year I say I'll never do them again. They are simply the poorest representation of what this game is all about. This year was no exception.



I only agreed to work the game if we could use NCAA mechanics and we could use this game as a training exercise. This seemed like a good idea since four of us were CCFOA candidates. All agreed and we decided to use seven-man mechanics.



I worked line judge (I typically work White Hat on JV/Fresh and Umpire on Var) which took a series or two for me to get my eyes back, so to speak. Holding my ground until the ball passed the LOS is not natural. This is not the same mechanic as five-man HS. Eventually, I settled in.



Even more challenging for me was trusting the field judge. Again, I was not used to having this help on passes to my sideline. We had one of those plays where the receiver danced the sideline. I saw feet in, but not the ball. I ruled catch, but the FJ saw the ball was not possessed in the field of play. I should have looked at him before killing the clock. Lesson learned.



All this was marred in the 2nd half of the game More than once we spoke with the team captains to get everyone under control and once we even brought both head coaches together to calm things down. Just a lot of pushing and smart mouthing. We ejected a player for throwing the ball at the opposite team's coach following a touchdown. It all finally came to a head when the benches cleared and there was a big brawl with about 4:00 remaining in the 4th. We tried for a good two minutes to get things under control. We'd get it stopped, then it would start-up again.



We finally ran off the field when fans entered the playing field. We were already being heckled and the losing side was looking for an excuse to take it out on us. When the cops came on the field, then I knew our jurisdiction was finally over.



All very sad since this game is for charity and these players are supposed to be 'all-stars'.

Now the fun begins

For anyone who has worked both High School and College Football, then I don't need to explain just how screwed-up your mind gets. I already find myself saying - oh crap, that's a HS rule. This is only my second season in the college rule book and I'm already feeling like I'm going to do something stupid.

For those who are not familiar with the 'distinctions' between the two systems, let me explain. In the Football Rule Differences 2007 book which outlines the differences between the two codes) there are 286 pages (after you exclude the index, table of contents, and other diagrams). Essentially, over 200 differences. Some are not that big of a deal - in HS you need shoes, but not socks. In NCAA you can kick barefoot but need socks otherwise. The number of panels on the ball, who can talk to the media. Simple things like that. Other rules are more complicated. In HS, no blocking below the waist except in the free block zone, but in NCAA, well this is a difference story depending upon who is doing the blocking, where it occurs on the field, and it which direction. This is blog entry in itself.

So, I paid my HS association dues ($75 bucks this year) and now have the 2007 HS books. I'm afraid to open them. I finally have what seems to be a fairly clear picture in my mind of what NCAA rules are and I'm going to cloud it all up with HS rules. The old timers tell me to not compare the two systems. But how do you avoid this?

My college mentor (who is a HS Crew Chief and a College White Hat) told me he worked HS for 15 years before he started college. When he first started college ball he said it was as if he never officiated before. It is a completely different game.