Be the Referee: Primary Areas
March 5, 2015
This week, MHSAA assistant director Mark Uyl explains how seeing the right angle is the most important part of officials making the right call.
Be The Referee is a series of short messages designed to help educate people on the rules of different sports, to help them better understand the art of officiating, and to recruit officials.
Below is this week's segment - Primary Areas - Listen
In just about every single basketball game ever played, there are times where fans will turn to each other and wonder, “why did that official make the call when there was another member of the crew that was a whole lot closer to the play?”
The most important thing in all of officiating and especially basketball officiating is: angle is the most important element for an official.
There will be many times during the game that the official that is closest to the play actually has the worst look or the worst angle. Many times the player is going up in the lane for that shot, and the whistle will come from one of the two outside officials because they had the perfect angle to see all the elements of the play and can rule correctly.
Past editions
Feb. 23 - Too Much TV - Listen
Feb. 16 - Video Clip Library - Listen
Feb. 9 - Cheer Safety - Listen
Feb. 2 - Basketball PA Announcers - Listen
Jan. 26 - Wrestling Health Concerns - Listen
Jan. 19 - Basketball Physical Contact - Listen
Jan. 12 - Video Review Part 2 - Listen
Dec. 29 - Video Review Part 1 - Listen
Dec. 17 - Registration Part 2 - Listen
Dec. 10 - Registration Part 1 - Listen
Dec. 3 - Legacy Program - Listen
Nov. 26 - Sideline Management - Listen
Nov. 19 - 7-Person Mechanics - Listen
Nov. 12 - Blocking Below the Waist - Listen
Nov. 5 - Tournament Selection - Listen
Oct. 29 - Uncatchable Pass - Listen
Oct. 22 - Preparation for Officials - Listen
Oct. 15 - Automatic First Downs - Listen
Oct. 8 - Officials & Injuries - Listen
Oct. 1 - Overtime - Listen
Sept. 25 - Field Goals - Listen
Sept. 18 - Tackle Box - Listen
Sept. 11 - Pass Interference - Listen
Aug. 25 - Targeting - Listen
“Who Needs This?”
May 24, 2013
One of the best barometers we have for informing us of the health of Michigan’s economy is to examine the number of registrations to be an MHSAA official. When the economy is poor, registrations trend upward; when the economy is improving, registrations decline.
Well, business must be booming in Michigan! Since the 2007-08 school year we’ve fallen almost 2,000 registrations.
Some of this decline can be explained away by the fact that registrations spiked upward when we allowed some free registrations in volleyball and basketball following the 2007 court-ordered changes in the girls volleyball and basketball seasons. But most of the recent decline – certainly the 1,000 decline of the past two years – is unrelated to discontinuing those promotional efforts; and it’s unrelated to a very reluctant resurgence in Michigan’s economy.
What is at work here now are two newer forces that frustrate efforts to maintain a pool of officials that is adequate to handle all the contests of a broad and deep interscholastic athletic program, and to handle those contests well:
- The first is the rise of social media and “instant criticism.” Spectators not only can critique calls before the official gets home from the game, those spectators can do so during the game. Their biased comments – and photos – can go worldwide before the official has left the venue! Really, who needs this? There have got to be less stressful hobbies.
- The second factor is the increased dependence on assigners. As local school athletic directors’ jobs became larger and more complicated, and as they were often given less time to do those jobs, more have had to turn to local assigners who will hire contest officials for groups of schools in one or more sports. As assigners built their little kingdoms, new officials have found it harder to break in and obtain a rewarding number of assignments. Many officials who have found themselves out of sorts with a local assigner have said, “Really, who needs this?” They find more fulfilling ways to spend their time.
The fact is that school-based sports – educational athletics – needs officials. We need them.
We need more officials and we especially need more young officials. Officials are vital members of the team that is necessary to provide a school-based sports program that actually does what it says it does – and that is to teach life lessons, including fair play and sportsmanship.