So you wanna be a game official..

There are difficult jobs to have in the world. Probably the most difficult job in sports is being a game official. whether that means referee, line judge, umpire, or tour official, you are under so much pressure to make split second decisions that affect people lives. In the last 40 days we have seen the sports world affected adversely and positively by game officials. Serena Williams getting defaulted because of her tirades and alleged threats against a line judge is an example . Serena lost it and she knows she was wrong, but the line judge did the right thing and the match was stopped as a result of two code of conduct penalties. In the baseball game last night, the umpire did not give the Tigers the correct call on a hit by pitch situation and they lost the game in the bottom of the inning. The job of an official is to get it right in any environment. As the games in baseball get more serious, the NBA gets started, and the NFL and college football season gets more meaningful,I thought we would discuss the game official.
As a fan do we expect the game official to get every call right? I do!!! I think that the purpose of having multiple officials in games to make sure the call is correct. We all know that these people have HUGE EGOS!!! and they don't like to be told they are wrong. But isn't the purpose of the game is to keep as much legislation out of it as possible? In the Phillies' win today, There was two calls that went against the Rockies that were clear blown calls by he umpires. Wouldn't it be appropriate for an umpire to get some assistance on a call? I think it should be, but when it is a bang bang play and the umpire is right there it is hard for him to ask for help because he is literally right there. Baseball seems to embrace the so called "legacy" play. Whether it is Richie Garcia calling Derek Jeter's home run a home run when clearly the fan went over the railing and caught the ball or the blown call in the cardinal royals world series at first base that led to the imploding of the cardinals in game 7, baseball doesn't believe in getting it right. Remember when Reggie stuck his hip out to purposely foil a double play in the world series? Hell even last night, the umpire should have asked for help from the first base umpire to see if he saw the ball hit the jersey of the tigers player. As i said yesterday, Matt Holliday was called safe in playoff game in 2007 and still hasn't touched home plate. The only positive about the baseball umps is that admit they made a mistake after the fact. However i am sure that brave fans are still waiting for Eric Gregg to apologize for the extra wide strike zone that he allowed when they played the marlins in the playoffs.
NFL refs and college refs get the most criticism.They officiate a game that a penalty could be called on every play. They have to determine whether something has happened faster than all other officials in any sport does. That is part of the reason that there is so many of them on a field. Most referee crew however don't have anyone under 30 working them and therefore they are not in position a lot of the time to make the right call. I give them a break usually but in college, they call way too many penalties and just when you think that they don't call the obvious penalty. The refs in college are in love with the celebration foul whistle. Kids are not allowed to celebrate in college unless with their team and any sign of someone saying look at me they are flagged immediately. The university of Georgia found out the hard way this past Saturday. Even though the refs tried to even it out by making the same ridiculous call against LSU, the damage was already done. Neither college or professional refs know what pass interference is and don't get me started about personal fouls and protecting quarterbacks.
However the worse refs are in the NBA. The NBA official takes everything that you learned about basic basketball and throws it out of the window. Every one who has played basketball on a team has been lectured at nauseum about help side defense. In the NBA it is illegal to zone an area for more than 2.5 seconds if you are providing help. What is a foul? Who knows and it depends who has the ball and who is committing the foul. I don't think Micheal Jordan, Larry Bird or Magic Johnson fouled out of 10 games between them in their entire careers. Shaquille Oneal went the first 12 years of career fouling out games maybe once or twice a season. The excuse was no one knew how to ref a game with a guy his size and strength. The refs don't call travelling either. I loved Patrick Ewing as a player but he walked all of the time. So did Dr.j and Jordan. So this season in The NBA fans better get used to Lebron and Shaq getting calls.
So in conclusion, i guess as a sports fan, we have to learn to accept that humans make mistakes. If that costs you a three team parlay that would have won you 600 large, then you should stop betting because more times than not a refs all is going to go against you. Hockey refs and boxing refs aren't perfect either. Ask Meldrick Taylor if he beat Julio Cesar Chavez. Ask the Buffalo Sabres..