Anthony Jordan.

Article says that SEC officials can’t call league games of their alma mater.

Link: https://www.gainesville.com/news/20070308/10-things-to-know-about-secs-referees

 

maybe should be amended to include schools in the same town as their alma mater.

 

Perhaps we should restrict our conversations to sports. Despite aggressive disagreements elsewhere, I'm 100% on board with you here. 100%.

It's not SEC, but indicative of the state of officiating overall, and it's been going on a long time.

We played Cocke County in the late '90s/early '00s at Cocke County. Theh had a stud RB in a kid they called Bubba. Can't remember his last name for sure, but I'm thinking White for some reason. I know. It's Cocke County where the refs always screw the visitors., but this was particularly bad.

Started off when one of the officials showed up to the game smelling like he had fallen into a vat of Jack Daniel's. The 1st half, they called 25 penalties on us & 2 on them. After the ass chewing our HC gave them going into halftime, one said, "We'll even it up in the 2nd half." Lot of good that does when you're down 3 TDs because every time we crossed the 50, flags were sure to come out to back us up. We had 3 long TDs called back during that 1st half. Should have been tied at the half.

Another time we were playing Sullivan South. The line judge was on South's sideline. His kids had played at South. Anytime we ran a play to his side, he flagged us. Every time. Not exaggerating one bit. From midway through the 2nd quarter until the end of the game, we ran every play away from his side. We still won that game, but it was ridiculous.

Another time, a team scored the winning touchdown with less than 1 minute to go. Lost by 1. They ran a fade on 3rd & 25 to set up the winning score. Their receiver ran 15 yards down their sideline out of bounds. Our guys didn't give up on him, but they backed off the receiver. He sure enough caught it for a huge gain. The refs did flag the play for illegal touching, BUT here's the kicker. The idiot white hat assessed the penalty from the end of the catch instead of from the line of scrimmage like he was supposed to do. Again, the HC lost his shit. The white hat INSISTED the penalty was assessed correctly even after the HC asked if we could have a receiver run behind our bench for 60 yards, step out into the field, and catch a pass. He reasoned that we'd still have a huge gain, so why not do it? White hat adamantly said, "You can do that." Of course he was wrong, but refused to correct the mistake even AFTER having the exact rule read to him straight from the NFHS rulebook.

I was back there on Monday for a jv game. I was the D coord on varsity & I ran the jv squad during games. Same white hat showed up to call the jv game. He hollered at me from 25 yards away to tell me that we were right & he was wrong about where the penalty should have been assessed. I was grabbed by another assistant who was a power lifter from Fort Payne, Alabama after I started running towards him screaming "No shit?" I was legit going to knock the sum[itch bay] out I was so pissed. That idiot cost us the game & as a result, a playoff spot.

All the above are 100% gospel truth that can be readily verified by multiple folks.

So, yes. I utterly hate officials. True, unadulterated, burning hatred.

 

I've seen way too many college basketball games where the officiating gets realllllly tedious if if gets outside of a certain point spread to ever believe it's more than 90% on the up and up.

I specifically remember one game in 2000 against South Carolina where we got to about a 18-20 point lead, and ever single time we got above that one specific official called everything he could on us. It was obvious. I was close enough to the count where I could ask him several times how much money he had riding on that game.

 

That’s the thing, those guys can really work that without really affecting the outcome

 

I assume you guys havent read the latest ESPN piece on Tim Donaghy. An amazing read.

 

There was another picture where he had lost a bet and had to wear a Bama shirt as punishment. Not sure I'd want him on my games if I'm Avery Johnson.

 

You think that's bad? Based on eyewitness testimony and a fair amount of hearsay, my high school alma mater has never lost a game except for the officials.

 

I get that sentiment, but this is beyond sour grapes. Like I said, we even won one of the games I described. Had to do it running every play to one side, but we had a good squad & won anyway.

 

High school officiating in TN is as bad as it gets. I imagine that would be a tough problem to solve as there isn't money to import guys from outside the area that have no interest, but damn, I've seen some really, really awful stuff. We lost a playoff game in OT a few years back where we scored a TD at the end of regulation that would have ended it. Saw the replay on the news. Half the guy's body was in the endzone. He could have extended the ball backwards and still broken the plan. Marked him an inch short. Ref standing right there on the goal line.

 

You do know that to be a TSSAA official, you just need to pass an untimed open book test, right?

It's pathetically awful.

 

I feel like football has gotten a little better.

But for a few years, it was pretty damn bad. If make a bad call, I can live with that but don't just make the shit up as you go.

 

The taking away a coach's ability to blackball an official makes coaches even more powerless. There is zero accountability for officials in TSSAA.

 

I don't doubt you jay. I've seen games that were like those you described. Heck, back in peewee days, we were playing this team in down in bammer, and I scored on three out of four third and goal plays for that were called back for holding. Our QB scored on the third. They finally counted it when we made up a play in the huddle that was a quasi-middle screen where every lineman held their hands up and be something to run around. Our coach had given up calling plays out of anger at that point (which was somewhat common). I think we lost the game. We probably had six or seven scoring plays called back.

 

People from my hometown are special when it comes to blaming refs. Attending every football game the last two seasons has been interesting listening to the amount of stupid in the stands. People should figure out when you have had maybe five winning seasons this century, it's probably not just the refs. I don't mean to lump you in that group.

 

That's hilarious. It reminded me of another incident.

Was a jv game, so no real implications, but it speaks to what coaches deal with.

Playing at old Rutledge High. The current HC at DB, Joey Christian, was our offensive coordinator & ran the jv squad this particular year. I was calling the defense. Their OL was holding like hell. Not your normal "there's holding on every play" stuff. After a half of complaining, Joey told our OL to hold every play. Start the 2nd half with the ball. Our guys held, but not good enough. Christian calls TO after one play, & I hear him screaming in the huddle for the OL to hold. One of our guys says they are. Christian goes on to explain, "I want you to fire off the ball, shoot your arms around them, bring your tails with you, and form tackle them." No way the refs didn't hear that. So, next play, they do it. No holding flags. Do it again. No flags. After about 5 plays, the head ref looks at our sideline & says, "Coach, I know what you're doing." To which Christian replied, "Good. I'm not exactly trying to hide it." But they never once threw a flag for holding. None. Our OL form tackled the defense the entire 2nd half & the officials didn't throw a single flag for holding the entire game.

 

Understand. I didn't take any offense.

I should get my wife to tell her stories of idiots in the stands while I was coaching. There are some real card-carrying levels of stupid out there.

And let me say this. My wife knows & understands football better than 90% of men in this world. Her dad raised her on it & after being a coach's wife for 20 years, I guess more rubbed off on her. It's only one of the reasons I think I have as perfect a wife as possible.

 

Our rec league officials must be TSSAA sanctioned.

We had one tell us this year that we could only have 7 men on the line of scrimmage.

 

"At least 7" , "no more than 7", eh, whats the difference?

 

You don't even ask them if he's sure in that situation. You just tell your wide out to take a step back.