“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.
The Official View: Just the Beginning
By
Brent Rice
MHSAA Assistant Director
September 24, 2018
By Brent Rice
MHSAA Assistant Director
This week’s “Official” View features a Legacy official who received a couple of very cool letters of encouragement from some very important people in recognition of his first MHSAA football contest.
Noah Lewis, out of Iron River, plays wingback and cornerback for West Iron County. This past Thursday night he served as a head linesman for a subvarsity game with close monitoring from his dad from the sidelines and the rest of the crew.
However, letters from NFL veterans Ed Hochuli and Bill Carollo also provided him some unexpected sage advice. Hochuli told Noah to “Just relax and have fun,” while Carollo offered to be there for Lewis for guidance or to provide a listening ear.
It’s Official!
Report Writing 101: Officials should be submitting incident reports whenever documenting ejections, unusual situations, or sportsmanship praises or concerns. While we certainly don’t need reports that would challenge Dickens in the writing department (we do get some of these), we do need enough detail that a clear picture is painted of the event for those administrators and directors in the Association office who are not present for the actual incident.
The who, what, where, when, and why of writing all apply. We need to know who is involved (name and number), what occurred leading up to the incident, when it occurred during the contest and why the official took the action he or she did.
Language counts … while we appreciate your discreetness when foul language occurs, please write what was said and done in detail – this includes writing out profanities in the report rather than “#^$*@^~!” or “bleeping.”
As Joe Friday would say, “Just the facts.” We don’t need any fluff or opinion. This means you don’t need to say that the play was close, that you got it right, the day was “blustery” or that “the coach was clearly out of control.” Tell us just the things we need to know to create the setting and what was said and done that led to your action.
Finally, you must complete the report within 48 hours of the end of the contest. Sooner would be better. There is nothing worse than trying to speak to a coach or administrator about an incident when we don’t even have the side of the official(s) yet.
P.S. Run your report through spell and grammar check before submitting if you have the opportunity.
Rule of the Week
CROSS COUNTRY One of the visiting coaches approaches the referee and points out to her where logs have been placed across the course to make it more challenging. This coach objects to these artificial barriers.
Ruling: These artificial barriers on the course must be removed so the course is clear of these obstructions.
It’s Your Call
FOOTBALL This week we look at the enforcement of the blindside block foul in football. It’s 3rd-and-21 on Team A’s 26-yard line. The slot receiver, #8 for white, clearly commits a blindside block in violation of the rules. With forceful contact, he blocks an opponent who does not see the blocker approaching.
One of the keys to look for in this play on the field is offensive players returning back towards the line of scrimmage. The question this week is: What is the down and distance if Team B (a) accepts (b) declines the penalty?
Last Week’s IYC Ruling: The swimmer did not make a legal turn since he took additional strokes after turning toward the breast. While swimmers may turn and independently kick or glide after their head passes the backstroke flags, they may not take any additional arm pulls other than in the actual turning action (8-2-f-1).
The Official View
Here's a closer look at those notes received by Noah Lewis, the aspiring Legacy Program official from Iron River:
