Ohio Referee Shortage - could force games...

 
Smarty2022 said:
I didn’t read the article. How does changing Games from Friday to Tuesday or any other day help with an Official shortage? There more Officials available on certain days of the week?
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It helps because if everyone plays on Friday, there is not enough people to fill every game. If you move X amount of games or other days those same refs can work games on other nights. Assuming they want to.
 
NCLFOOTBALL said:
It helps because if everyone plays on Friday, there is not enough people to fill every game. If you move X amount of games or other days those same refs can work games on other nights. Assuming they want to.
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Those same Refs are already working Middle School,Frosh and JV Games on other nights?
 
Smarty2022 said:
I didn’t read the article. How does changing Games from Friday to Tuesday or any other day help with an Official shortage? There more Officials available on certain days of the week?
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Football, varsity especially, is traditionally only on Friday nights. Thus all crews are working. If there are not enough, then playing say 1/3 of Varsity games on Thursdays, 1/3 on Fridays, and 1/3 on Saturdays means they would work all three nights and thus get games covered. Sub-varsity and others may suffer (i.e. JH or peewee) but this is where we are at. Heck last Tuesday our community's 7th and 8th grade teams played effectively a double header on the HS field with lights and turf due to the shortage.

Other sports are also short. As an example this spring in baseball in SW Ohio many schools with lights are scheduling weeknight JV/V or JV/Freshmen doubleheaders already as its easier to have a crew do two games at one site than two crews at two sites.

Until numbers improve - which is a whole separate conversation as to why and how - this is going to continue.

I asked a DAB member if they would add a spiel to the pregame "Our officials for tonight's contest...." blurb about "If you are interested in learning more about officiating or becoming an official to help address the shortage visit OHSAA.org/officiating" and was told no. Maybe they need to say "If you are stuck on the fact Friday night lights is now Thursday night, here is why."
 
A possible solution, although not ideal, is lowering the number of officials they use per crew. Again, not ideal, but we may see 3 man crews in the future. Because moving these games to other days of the week is going to hurt freshman, JV, Middle School and Youth games. And we will get to a point where those younger aged games can't happen because the officials are all working varsity games on a Tuesday or whatever it may be.

Also, in my sons' youth league, they actually did something original and hopefully beneficial for the future. They essentially started an officiating program for high school aged kids to officiate the youth games. NOW, they are NOT the only official. They must work with 2 other high school certified officials. The kids are getting paid the same as the other officials do for the youth games. It has been great so far because they are learning the ropes of officiating...... and the kids I've spoken to that are in it love it. Many of them are high school players and this allows them to make a few bucks during the football season. The goal is to have them fully certified officials with the state in 4-5 years. I'm hoping this expands to get more younger people interested in officiating which will hopefully alleviate this problem for the future.
 
I hate to say it, but I won't do Saturday games as an official. That day is for me to watch College football, maybe if the game started at 9 am I would. I will do JV games in the morning but not Saturday afternoon or night. Thursday night would be hard for me to do Varsity as well, the reason needing to be there 90 minutes before game time. One night a week I can do that, but not more than one, if they changed the rule to 30 or 45 minutes I would be able to make varsity games on other weeknights.

Not a fan of the 90 minutes before game time right now when all of the games start at 7pm. Work, traffic, and my kids at home make that very hard to get there by 530 each Friday. If the games start at 8 like in the old days, it would be a lot easier to do.
 
Zeta16 said:
I hate to say it, but I won't do Saturday games as an official. That day is for me to watch College football, maybe if the game started at 9 am I would. I will do JV games in the morning but not Saturday afternoon or night. Thursday night would be hard for me to do Varsity as well, the reason needing to be there 90 minutes before game time. One night a week I can do that, but not more than one, if they changed the rule to 30 or 45 minutes I would be able to make varsity games on other weeknights.

Not a fan of the 90 minutes before game time right now when all of the games start at 7pm. Work, traffic, and my kids at home make that very hard to get there by 530 each Friday. If the games start at 8 like in the old days, it would be a lot easier to do.
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Great points. I had no clue you had to be there 90 minutes ahead of time. Wow.

And the draw for many for a gig like officiating is it's 1-2 days per week. Not officiating 7 days per week. When would you find time to do simple things like mowing the lawn. It becomes a full time job at that point; a full time job with no benefits at that.
 
cincifbfan said:
A possible solution, although not ideal, is lowering the number of officials they use per crew. Again, not ideal, but we may see 3 man crews in the future. Because moving these games to other days of the week is going to hurt freshman, JV, Middle School and Youth games. And we will get to a point where those younger aged games can't happen because the officials are all working varsity games on a Tuesday or whatever it may be.

Also, in my sons' youth league, they actually did something original and hopefully beneficial for the future. They essentially started an officiating program for high school aged kids to officiate the youth games. NOW, they are NOT the only official. They must work with 2 other high school certified officials. The kids are getting paid the same as the other officials do for the youth games. It has been great so far because they are learning the ropes of officiating...... and the kids I've spoken to that are in it love it. Many of them are high school players and this allows them to make a few bucks during the football season. The goal is to have them fully certified officials with the state in 4-5 years. I'm hoping this expands to get more younger people interested in officiating which will hopefully alleviate this problem for the future.
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3 man varsity ? They'll go to two man sub varsity (equally insane) before that happens.

I won't be a part of either.

Staggering the varsity contests will allow all the games to be covered...... for now. ;)
 
AllSports12 said:
They'll lose more veterans if that happens. I've worked three man JV.... (due to in game injury)

Impossible to properly officiate.
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I've coached games like that for the same reason. It is impossible to officiate properly.

I guess my question is essentially, what loses less veterans..... going to a 4 man crew on Friday nights, or spreading the games all throughout the week?

The other worrisome aspect about spreading out games is the nightmare scheduling becomes for schools. It's going to have quite the ripple effect with boys' and girls' soccer using the same fields as football. Then throw in Freshman, JV games for all 3 of those sports.

Lastly, the issue of rest for football needs to be talked about. It's going to be pretty hard for a team to play let's say on a Sunday, then possibly again on a Thursday night.

All of these become logistical nightmares. I'd really hate to be an AD in the current climate that sports have.
 
This has been a problem in New York state for years. Thursday and Saturday games are common. Pennsylvania saw it start last year. And there seems to be at least one or two Thursday or Saturday games that aren't 'usual'. Texas has been dealing with it but not as noticeable because the big city districts have so many teams sharing facilities they've had Thursday and Saturday games by necessity anyways. But now you're seeing small rural schools having Thursday games because there's just not enough officials and the travel becomes a problem. So, multiple games for one crew.

It's going to get worse before it gets better. Because either you have unqualified officials fresh into the job that fans will hate, or you have smaller crews (who wants 3 or 4 man crews? I don't) or you have more days for games to have the same crews to do. But then you have to rely on those crews doing multiple games a weekend.
 
Guys on my crew are friends with a guy that used be to an Ohio official but is now in Florida. Down there they do not have set crews and positions for varsity games. So, he does more varsity games a week and they make more a game (I think over 100).

Ohio is crew based for varsity which adds that extra time for each Varsity game (lower level need to be there 20 minutes before the game). This adds time and really should be on site 30 minutes before kick and on field 20 minutes before kick. There is a lot of wasted time before kick that could be reduced. Personally, being there less time and a later start would be great, any other job than teaching and I would not be able to get to games on Friday night without taking time off, which would make doing varsity games a wash. I love being around football still and have a blast on Friday night, but the time and hassle to get there so early causes a lot of friction in my family. That would be the number one reason to get out, not the complaining fans and coaches (which make me chuckle inside, they think I care who wins, nope just that I follow the gold book and rule book to a T and make sure safety issues are priority number one)
 
i’m really not sure why more schools don’t play some thursday night games.. i’ve always loved them! would also help with referee shortage problem as i’m sure some refs would be interested in doing both days. some won’t, but you only need a few to do a few days. as one ref pointed out above, they don’t want to do saturdays.

i remember one time when i was in high school, they played a junior high game at 5:30 on friday night and varsity kicked off by 7:30.
 
Zeta16 said:
Guys on my crew are friends with a guy that used be to an Ohio official but is now in Florida. Down there they do not have set crews and positions for varsity games. So, he does more varsity games a week and they make more a game (I think over 100).

Ohio is crew based for varsity which adds that extra time for each Varsity game (lower level need to be there 20 minutes before the game). This adds time and really should be on site 30 minutes before kick and on field 20 minutes before kick. There is a lot of wasted time before kick that could be reduced. Personally, being there less time and a later start would be great, any other job than teaching and I would not be able to get to games on Friday night without taking time off, which would make doing varsity games a wash. I love being around football still and have a blast on Friday night, but the time and hassle to get there so early causes a lot of friction in my family. That would be the number one reason to get out, not the complaining fans and coaches (which make me chuckle inside, they think I care who wins, nope just that I follow the gold book and rule book to a T and make sure safety issues are priority number one)
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There’s really no reason to keep crews in Ohio anymore other than tradition. The Gold Book has made consistent crews unnecessary. Basketball by and large has gone away from assigning by crew in Ohio – and it’s for the best.
 
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