Well here we are on the brink of another NFL season. High School and college have already began and the local youth league starts this weekend. I have coached for the past 4 years and for the first time will be very limited in my involvement with Collins team. I did not sign up to coach at all when we registered him this year. The coach asked me to help out with the defensive backs so I have done a little with them and helped out with the kickoff return team. But I will no longer be roaming the sidelines screaming at kids for not doing what they should be on every play. I instead have traded in my coaches whistle for a referees whistle. Yes it is true I am now a zebra. I am now on the side of those striped guys that I have been frustrated with all these years and have wondered if they even knew what was going on out on the field. Why did I cross over to the dark side you ask? Well I figured they needed all the help they could get. Truth is two years ago I was really frustrated with the officiating at the high school and youth levels of football. It seemed that there was no consistency to the officiating. I decided to look into becoming a certified official. I did just that got the books studied and took and passed the test. I was even able to do one youth game at the end of the season. I literally hung up my coaches whistle on a Tuesday evening after we lost our playoff game and refereed a game on Thursday. When I steeped onto the field with my stripes on it just felt different. I must say I was nervous what if I make a mistake? How will the crowd react to my call's? Rick the gentleman that asked me to help him must have sense my nervousness told me not to worry about a thing. He told me simply that when you throw that yellow flag one side of the Field will be happy with your call and the other side will not plain and simple. That is true with out a doubt. The game went fine to my knowledge I did not make any bad calls.
The following year I decided not to be a head coach and just focus on refereeing. When I signed Collin up I put on the form that I would be willing to be an assistant if needed... Mistake. as it turned out I was needed and after some bad circumstances they kicked the head coach out of the league and guess who got to step in as the head coach? Me! I did ref most of the games that our team was not in. On many saturdays last season I would ref a game at 9:00Am, coach our game at 10:30AM and ref another game at noon. It was stressful mainly due to the fact that I was a head coach for one team and would then ref a game consisting of teams I had coached against the week before. After a few games though the other coaches realized that I woul call a fair game.
This season I will be refing only. I will not be on the sidelines of Collins games as a coach. I may however need to ref a game that he is playing in. The league will try not to put me in that situaion but we have a limited number of officials and I may be asked to do it.
After being on both sides of the equation I believe I like refing better than coaching. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed coaching but reffing is just different. I love the game of football and to be a major part of a game is great mabey not as great as playing but I enjoy it none the less. As I said earlier I have seen so much incosistancy in officiating over the years I decided to do something about it. Am I perfect? No way I have made a few mistakes but all in all I think I have done ok. I hope to move up and eventually do high school games.
This season I will be refing only. I will not be on the sidelines of Collins games as a coach. I may however need to ref a game that he is playing in. The league will try not to put me in that situaion but we have a limited number of officials and I may be asked to do it.
After being on both sides of the equation I believe I like refing better than coaching. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed coaching but reffing is just different. I love the game of football and to be a major part of a game is great mabey not as great as playing but I enjoy it none the less. As I said earlier I have seen so much incosistancy in officiating over the years I decided to do something about it. Am I perfect? No way I have made a few mistakes but all in all I think I have done ok. I hope to move up and eventually do high school games.
