what can be done about the state of the officiating

SJeasy

Registered User
Feb 3, 2005
12,538
3
San Jose
As I was watching, the officials picked up the phone at the scorer's table briefly at the time. There was little or no conversation. I do wonder whether they could have called Toronto for a clarification.

I read the ref CBA and understand that they can release 4 officials per year of the 34 linesman and 33 refs that the union may protect. The CBA has three levels of tenure. An official with under 6 years can be released almost at will and usually at the end of the season. Up to 16 years, the benchmark is for an official not to be selected to the playoffs for two consecutive years in which case his overall performance will be reviewed where a release may ensue. After 16 years, my understanding is that it is basically when the ref is has undergone material physical decline. There is a section dealing with helping refs to transition to other work after they are done with the NHL.

Not only do the refs go through a two week camp, they also have midseason refreshers.

I cannot imagine how difficult it is at this point for the refs in that they have been asked to raise the level of enforcement. There have been complaints for non-calls, but the outcry over mistaken calls is far greater and with pressure from above to call more, they will make more mistaken calls than in the past. The new enforcement levels have just made the refs even more of a target.
 

BCCHL inactive

Guest
(You mention the 4 officials; it's actually up to the 2 referees to understand the rules, the linesmen aren't responsible for understanding the rule book cover to cover like the referees are).

As a regular linesman, I will say that yes, we are responsible for knowing all the rules. We have to pass the same exam the referees do (at least at the national level, I'm not 100% sure about the NHL, but I could find out). In this particular case, both linesmen should have been aware enough to tell the referees they were f'ing up big time.

Spada and Watson are incompetent, and that's all there is to it.

Based on one mistake?

I'd hate to work for you.
 

Ted Hoffman

The other Rick Zombo
Dec 15, 2002
28,856
8,110
OK, well first, with all due respect, if you don't even know what happened, you shouldn't be commenting on the subject.
With all due respect, I think the example has been pretty adequately covered here and I think I've been pretty clear in saying that the officials clearly screwed up.
 

EbencoyE

Registered User
Nov 26, 2006
1,958
5
1. I'm fairly confident that the referees have read the rulebook and are aware of what the rules are

I'm sure they do too. But sometimes I can't help but think the officials have no idea what they're doing.

I don't mind the non-calls as much because most of the time they don't affect the game. I do mind the non-calls though when they'll call it one minute, and let it go a minute later.

For example, a player on the breakaway can get hooked from behind or interfered with and get a powerplay. Yet only a few minutes later, the same thing could happen and it WON'T get called. It's the inconsistency that bothers me. And this has happened many times this season alone. Though I do believe it has gotten better from last season.

But what bothers me the most is when it seems like the officials make up their own rules to the game and call a penalty just because they feel like it.

For example, a player skating through center ice without ANYONE near him, can simply trip and fall to his knees and get a powerplay for it. This has happened MANY times over the past year or so and it bugs me the most. It's as if the referees think that just because a player fell there was a penalty involved somewhere.

So teams get powerplays just because their players can't skate or lose their balance. Maybe they don't have great views of the play when it happens, but they should still be SURE it was a penalty before calling it. I'd rather it be a non-call than a made up penalty that gives a team an undeserved advantage.

This really bugs me because this is bordering on diving which is a huge problem in soccer. I don't want hockey to turn into soccer with players falling all over the place. (Some already do it) players get powerplays all the time because they fall down when a stick gets fairly close to their face. It makes me sick when I see replays of players grabbing their faces in "pain" when they were never even touched by the stick.

If they simply video reviewed every call they could put a stop to most of these problems. Seems like a lot of effort, but I think it'd be worth it. Players wouldn't dive if they knew the guys up in the booth could slow it down and see he was acting.

If the referee doesn't have the best view of it maybe they could atleast has the guys in the booth for a second judgment before calling a penalty. Though I doubt a referee would do that because they're so afraid of looking like they made a mistake.

What's really sad is that the guys in Toronto don't know the rules either. In a Penguins - Lightning game the other night Reechi kicked a puck and it deflected off Sarich's skate and into the net. This is obviously a disallowed goal and the referees quickly waved it off like expected. BUT when they went to Toronto to review the goal like they normally do, Toronto overturned it. Why? I don't think we'll ever know. Maybe they don't think Reechi purposely kicked it. However, that is not CONCLUSIVE evidence to overturn the call on the ice. Because the only way you'd know that is if you somehow could read Reechi's mind.

The NHL's officiating is embarrassing. Sure, it might have something to do with the sport being harder to referee than most other sports. But that still doesn't excuse most of the stuff they pull. Maybe we just need a few more years to get used to the new system.
 

GuloGulo

Registered User
Nov 16, 2005
3,714
0
trunkofacamaro
That particular example is bad; however, it's not like it happens every game.

Pre-lockout, there was a Blues-Coyotes game where the first 4 penalties of the game were matched with coincidental penalties for diving. Is it possible there were really 4 dives - one on each penalty called? Sure. Is it likely? Nope.

A lot of people love to ***** about officiating. Until you've done it (and I suspect 99% of those who complain never have), you honestly have no idea just how tough it is. Sure it looks easy to do; go try it a few times and see if it's as easy as you think.

I know guys who constantly complained about calls, and when offered the chance to call a game themselves they steadfastly refused. I knew a few who took up the offer; after one game, they quit complaining about the officials after that. I'm not saying the guys employed by the league now are perfect by any means, but by and large they do a decent job.

For the record, I have a bigger problem with how umpires call strikes in MLB than I do the officiating in the NHL - and there's no outcry to toss umpires because they clearly can't call the strike zone according to the rule book.

Sometimes the refs are outright wrong. It happens. You still can't fire every ref who screws up, you'll eventually run out of experienced refs.

In the long run, the refs can never beat the fans. They cannot use 10 replays in slow mo, youtube, internet boards etc and discuss every situation to ad nauseam. They have to make a decision right there and then.

To improve the reffing quality, I'd like to see the league go back to a one-ref system.
 

BCCHL inactive

Guest
To improve the reffing quality, I'd like to see the league go back to a one-ref system.

:banghead:

The game today is too fast for one referee to skate end-to-end for 60 minutes. If they went back to one referee, it would be a detriment to quality because as the game moves into the 3rd period and on, and the players get more intense trying to win the game, that one referee will be more concentrated on not crumbling to complete physical exhaustion than he will be on calling the game.

NHL officials do have to pass fitness testing, but even marathon runners would have trouble keeping up to an NHL game for 60 minutes without a break. Intermissions and TV timeouts just aren't enough.
 

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