Preface: I think my original reply to your post was well thought-out and non-combative. Calling my premise bullshit and implying I don't know basketball is unnecessary, man. It's okay if we disagree. I have some thoughts on the article you referenced and hope we can have a civil discussion on it.
Another thing to point out - You said in another post that college refs officiate part-time and most have other jobs. That is simply not true. Just because they are not full-time employees of the NCAA does not mean that they are not full-time independent contractors during the season.
College basketball referees are independent contractors, who can work at present in as many conferences as want to take them.
Again, most are full-time, seasonal independent contractors. This is not a side job for these guys.
statsheet.com
Good resource. I use it regularly.
If everyone wants better officiating and I have not talked to a person in college basketball that does not, including several referees, then one thing needs to happen right away.
Again...true. Everyone invested in a sport with constantly changing styles and rules should always seek improvement. However, he seems to be implying that people want improvement because the current system leads to poor results that can be measured in fact. That's not what I get from the opinions on the consensus. Jay Bilas has advocated many times for centralization of training courses that provide better clarification on new rules and allow officials to brainstorm on current trends. This suggestion has been met with seemingly universal support. Wanting "better officiating" does not mean that people think that the officials are performing poorly. People want consistency in how rules are applied. That's what's behind the push for centralization.
there needs to be one national supervisor, with a staff, who makes every assignment for every conference
That's an awful idea. There are too many teams playing too many games. The recent implication of conference-partnerships is a great solution when it comes to hiring and assigning the crews.
If you get that official on the last night of a long extended officiating trip, working several nights in a row across the country, he is just not going to be fresh and on top of his game, there is no way he can be.
Apologies that I don't have it available right now, but there are stats that prove this is not true. There has never been a correlation found between a crew working several games in a row and that crew making more mistakes as the trip progresses. I believe statsheet actually has that information.
David Hall is one of the best college basketball referees ever, he has worked many NCAA tournaments games and Final Fours.
Yep and he got there by receiving high marks on his reviews done by all the people contracting him.
here is just a sample of his schedule this year in November, in which he officiated 12 days in a row, in 11 different cities
Saying "just a sample" and proceeding to provide an extreme case of officiating load is bad journalism. This is not a normal load for an official.
Now Mr. Hall and anyone else who wants to challenge me, might argue he was up to the task on that 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th day. Bring it on, but I say no way was he the same official, no matter how great he is, at the end of that trip as at the beginning.
Official performance has plenty of metrics that could prove his point. I know that they completely discredit his point. As the journalist, you'd think he'd be the one giving those statistics to provide some credibility to his argument. Instead of giving readers information, he challenges them? Alright...
Once again the NBA gets it right, their officials are their employees, they space the games out, plenty of rest and down time, so they can be as fresh as possible
The NBA is managing games played between 30 teams. There are 351 schools in Division I. This is a terrible comparison.
He keeps talking about rest like there's some sort of universal fatigue plaguing college refs. The crews with the craziest schedule are new crews trying to build up their credentials by working a lot of games for a lot of smaller conferences. Still, even these crews are (1) regionally based and not working so much that it has an effect on quality.
One last great argument for making the NCAA over everything. Many of these league supervisors of officials have summer camps and clinics. They have the right to do that, but there is also much hidden pressure on officials who are moving up to attend these summer camps. Many young officials I have talked with feel it might affect future assignments. You be your own lawyer here. Just follow the money.
I have no idea what he's trying to get at here. Yes, exposure is an important part of being contracted. So? Follow the money? What money? What does networking have to do with a money trail?
That article is awful. His arguments are based in fantasy. Maybe he knows that, which is why he pulled a "come at me bro" instead of providing any actual data.
The current system of total at-will employment allows the league supervisors to never hire a crew again if they royally fuck up. However, if the crew does well, they'll earn more games and more important games at that. Then the bigger conferences will take note and the opportunity to move into power conferences arises. If they seize that opportunity and continue performing well, the NCAA itself will notice and they might be given the opportunity for post-season jobs.
The current system forces crews to be diligent in keeping up with rules and their applications, the styles of the teams they're officiating, and all of the other things necessary to move up and continue being contracted.
The push for centralization coming from coaches and people who aren't so obscure writer like this guy is not being made because these people think officials suck at their job. They want consistency in how the officials call games. Coach 'X', who plays in a league where application of rules allows more freedom of movement is sick of playing post-season games with B1G crews where his guys can get mauled, because now his system no longer works. That's what the advocates of centralization want to fix.