It seems like the refs are losing more and more college football games. They do make mistakes, but that’s not what I am referring to. It seems like there is so much emphasis on missing calls on TV and fans praising the refs.
One SEC officiating crew was recently suspended after receiving calls from Florida-Arkansas and UGA-LSU fans. Georgian and Arkansas fans not only sent hate mails, but also called officials’ homes with bizarre messages accusing them of many things. You could be on the take, have gambling problems, or even deliberately try to alter the score.
This is the first time I remember a crew being removed. However, I have received similar calls or missed calls every week from the refs. This crew is in such a difficult situation.
Recently, I was told by ESPN that 25 cameras were installed at a Monday Night NFL game. With that level of scrutiny, officials are not really given a chance. They’re not perfect, and there will always been missed calls. It’s almost as if the media and fans are trying to make missed calls more prominent and shouting bloody murder.
You should think twice about accusing an official of wrongdoing if you have not officiated at least one sporting event at high school. It’s a very demanding job. While I don’t condone bad officiating, it is something that I do not condone. The conferences of college football need to be vigilant, critical, and accountable for the officiating. However, I’ve seen inconsistency from the conferences and their reaction to fans and media. It is not a consistent and logical policy to improve officiating.
I’ve also witnessed an increase in the ugliness of football fans. If you have paid for your ticket and feel the need to yell at, or boo the officials, that’s your right. To hunt them down and send hate mails and voicemails after the game is overboard, I think, is a very unacceptable behavior. Is this the kind of behavior we should accept?
I have done some coaching and had many conversations on the sidelines with refs where they admitted that they missed a call or didn’t see it as clearly as they should. There have been spbo live score some instances of really poor officiating. However, at the high school and lower levels I wondered what the adults thought they were teaching the children by the poor behavior I witnessed towards refs.
Let me conclude by saying that I do not believe that bad officiating should be allowed without trying to solve the problem. The people responsible for overseeing and regulating officials should do so consistently and fairly. Instead of imposing a suspension to react to media attention, create policies that will ensure consistent punishment according to published criteria.
Fans should allow refs to take a break from the game and think about all the right calls they make during split-second decisions in the many, many games they call. It’s just a game.
