• Welcome to Fearless Friday Bulletin Boards. Please login or sign up.

 FF is powered by:        Do Not Sell My Personal Information

AAA urging parents to quit riding refs

Started by Jack1990, January 18, 2019, 10:26:06 pm

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.


Gray lizard

I read that in the local paper here in Russellville.
Nice write up but that will never change and it is nothing new. As long as there are close scoring games there will be upset fans.

RATTLER43

Let me preface this by saying there are lots of poor officials out there.   There are many who lack experience.  There are ones who cannot keep up with the speed of the game.

There are tons of missed calls.  But that is human.  We don't expect teams to shoot 100% from the floor, from the line, and have zero turnovers every game.  We are all human and make mistakes.  But in my 5 decades of sports as an athlete, coach, fan, and official I have rarely seen the officials make one call that determined a game's outcome. I have seen some that were perceived that way just like yesterday's games.  But in reality, bad calls and no calls went against each team.  The big no call on the interference happened so late in the game that it was supermagnified.    And, in my career, I have rarely seen officials call against one team.  Maybe 5 total in literally thousands of contests.    The officials were, in those cases, in the wrong by allowing a fan or coach to get to them and it went one-sided from my scenarios.     I had three in my coaching career (thought it was so many more until I went back and poured over the videos to realize that they missed about equal calls on both sides and I had just noticed the ones that went against my teams.).   

Upset fans are fine.  That has always been the case.  Fans berating officials from start to finish, game after game, getting super personal, threats, and trying to "visit" with them after the games is where we are. And it is at levels never seen before.  I see it often as an administrator.  Sit on one side of a gym and hear it then walk to the other side and hear the same thing.  Both sides thinking the officials are cheating them or against them.   I see it at little league games, travel ball games, AAU games, middle school games, junior high games, senior high games, ...     Officials and coaches being attacked physically and verbally.   Unacceptable.

Yes, I believe officials are more thin-skinned now than they used to be. But I also believe fans cross the line so much more often now.  Officials "listening" for the fans to cross the lines makes it even worse as they are focused on the fans instead of the game.   Bad for everyone.

It would be great to attend games where 99% of the screaming was in support of your own team.  Yes, get upset at that one horribly blown call against your team, yell, then back to cheering on your group.  When you do yell at just that one, I assure you that as a former official, we know when we miss them.  Not done on purpose.   You let us know and we move on.  But to ride us about that one for the next two quarters finally wears some officials down.     Most of us oldtimers just take it with a grain of salt.  The oldtimer fans used to be a lot more creative with their yelling (and very funny sometimes. I have lots of stories.)   But, the young guns try officiating and typically get run off before they can get good at it. 

I agree that we need to back off just a little as fans.   Especially at the lower levels.  Anything below college should be a little less aggressive on the yelling.   If we are constantly blaming officials for losses, it seems that parents are teaching kids to lay blame instead of overcoming adversity. 

Just my take on it.

football_referee

I have been involved with football since the early 80's  I have seen and heard my parent get all over the officials in games that I played and when I would go watch the Razorbacks play that was the way I thought you were suppose to act towards officials.  When I became a official I realized how wrong my parents were. 
My first couple of years as a official I had rabbit ears and heard everything, I learned to ignore the fans for the most part every once in awhile a fans will come up with a big zinger that causes me to laugh to my self. 

I can also ignore the sidelines but there is one word that is said that I deem it gets personal  "YOU" then anything that is said after that has my attention and could result in a flag

I think some people have lost their minds when it comes to sports, I have been threatened over calls, I had stuff thrown at me, I had drinks thrown on me, and I have even had guys on my crew that have had players strike them.  I know people are passionate about their teams and if they applied their passion to help solving the world problems this world would be a better place to live.

As seen last weekend officials on all levels miss calls some just on bigger stages

Every night before my crew takes the field I remind them that this game is played and officiated by humans, Player, Coaches, and Officials make mistakes try to minimize your mistakes and learn from them so you don't make that mistake again.  There is no Prefect game and that if I ever call a prefect game that when I will retire.     

Fox 16 Arkansas Fox 24 Arkansas