So let’s quickly revisit Larry Synder’s list of “What It Take To Be A Great Football Official.”

Study Rules of the Game

• Rule Book
• Tests & Quizzes
• Ask Other Officials
• Quiz a Buddy
• Never Stop Learning

Study Mechanics of Game

• CCA Mechanics Manual
• Camps & Clinics
• Philosophy
• Attend area meetings/rules study groups (Do any of you do this now?)
• Surround yourself with better officials
• Its hard to soar with the eagles, when you are surrounded by turkeys.

Part Two

• Watch film – the single biggest factor to rapidly improving your learning and accelerating your advancement. Countless seasoned NCAA and NFL veterans have pointed out to me during their interviews that film review tremendously improved their abilities. In some ways you can consider watching film as a close substitute for snaps. Granted, nothing will take the place of live play, but watching film can definitely add a different perspective while adding to your experience level. Some have suggested that it can advance your learning by a factor of four! What this means is that you can shave three years off your experience level if you are trying to get promoted to a higher level. An aspiring motivated official with 4 years of experience (1 of which was heavy on film review) is similar to an official with 7 years experience (no film review). How do you think guys get into the NFL at age 34? You can bet they spent time in front of a TV reviewing film.

• Experience – How much is enough? Larry is very clear here. Get as much experience on the field as possible. This means youth league, spring and fall scrimmages, junior varsity games, varsity games at the high school level and then basically the same process at the college level. When making the transition to college, you will find conference supervisors are looking for those individuals that are willing to take the scrimmage and JV games. They want a prospect to have a few games under their belt before putting them on the field. There truly is no substitute for experience. I have personally stood on teh sidelines behind seasoned Division I officials just to ask questions, watch from that angle and get a feel for the speed and quickness of the game at the higher levels. Without a doubt, this helped me in my first scrimmage giving me a small comfort level (that is, until the whistle blew!).

• What You Have Control Over – This was the cornerstone of Larry’s list. I hear often, officials at all levels, complain that they can’t get the good games, they can’t get the supervisor’s attention, can’t get noticed and so on… You can probably name a few in your local associaiton or area too. So let’s look at that statement. What can we control? Well for one, I can control my ability to study and know the rules and mechanics of the game. I can use the rule book, study groups, practice or scrimmage activity to really and fully know the rules. I can stay in good physical conditioning. This will allow me to get into position, be quick and react in a timely manner. It will help me look athletic in my uniform. Let me be clear – The Division I conferences have a ZERO tolerance for officials out of shape or overweight. Coaches and players prepare year around for the season. The zebras are no exception. Just take a look at the NFL staff. The athleticism and physical fitness is at its highest level. Its that important.  Attend every learning opportunity you can. Clinics, camps, rules study groups, association meetings, scrimmages, film sessions. While not necessarily consistent across the board, learning opportunities still abound in various forms in every city, state or region. Whether you take advantage of them or not is another topic.

So that’s all for my comments on Larry’s philosophy. I personally know several officials that have been mentored by Larry and they are all performing at the highest levels today. They will all admit that the process wasn’t easy and often times the requirements were not what they wanted to hear. Yet the followed the path and Larry led them in the right direction.

This post is getting long so I’m going to save my next story for tomorrow. It’s about how I applied Larry’s philosophy to gain entrance into the West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

Be the Best on the Field!

Todd

The NFL requires it, John McGrath has it, all NCAA conference supervisors desire it.

Integrity.

Success in sports is familiar territory to John McGrath. Once the Kentucky High School Athelete of the Year, football scholarship recipient to the University of Kentucky then later the Kentuckiana Football Officials Association Rookie of the Year, John still remains humble and thankful to those that helped him obtain his current position as Tony Corriente’s Head Linesman.

So where did Integrity come into play in John’s career? Well as John was getting started officiating high school football he had a chance to work some small college games. One of John’s mentors, Paul Schmidt; asked John to join him in a Independant Officials group which would work NCAA games for those independant schools not affiliated with a major conference (pre-conference USA). The acceptance date was in January. Now John had been applying to enter the SEC for several years and this was no different. Problem was the SEC didn’t decide until mid February. John went ahead and accepted Paul’s offer in January.

Guess who called in February? You got it, the SEC. They offered John a position on an SEC crew. After a 24 hour wait, John called the SEC back and declined the job. He had already given his word to Paul. Now you might think…WHAT? Turn down the SEC? No way, man!

John officiated  in the Independant group for one year and then it folded. He was now without a major conference. So he applied and was eventually accepted to the Big East where he worked ten years (and in nine bowl games).

Later, John was called to New York City to interview for the NFL. During the NFL, several of the interview committee inquired as to why John turned down the SEC. His response, “I gave the man my word.” And  John firmly believes that was a determing factor in his being hired to the NFL.

Integrity is one of those intangible qualities you can’t teach, train or demand it be there. It shows up in the toughest decisions, the trying times, moments that define you as an official. It’s also completely under your control…And when you think no one notices, your decisions from the past are brought back up for inspection and review. Just be sure they don’t haunt you.

Here is the most current list of USA Football Camps and Seminars:

USA Football Officiating Schools

Our Officiating Schools are two-day clinics designed to improve your skills as a youth or high school football official. You will work scrimmages in crews of 5 and 7, and receive valuable feedback from NFL and Division I officials.

Registrants will participate in film review of those scrimmages. During classroom sessions, unique plays from the 2008 high school & college football season will be used to discuss mechanics, philosophy and rules applications for all levels of officiating.

Schools will be priced from $250-$300

USA Football Officiating Seminars

Our Officiating Seminars are one day classroom clinics which include breakout sessions by position and topic.  Unique plays from the 2008 high school and college season will be used to discuss mechanics, philosophy and rules applications for all levels of officiating.

Seminars will be priced from $75-$100

Meals and a USA Football gift are included for schools and seminars.

Officiating Schools; fieldwork with scrimmages

Date         City            Location

April 3-4      Phoenix, AZ         Moon Valley High School
May 8-9      Miami, FL                     university of Miami
May 15-16   Tampa, FL                   Tampa Bay Buccaneers
May 16-17   Jacksonville, FL                   Sandalwood High School
Aug. 26-28*   Blaine, MN         National Sports Center
(possible)

Officiating Seminars; classroom only

April 25      Los Angeles, CA        Santa Monica College
May 3      Green Bay, WI        Lambeau Field
May 16      Fairfax County, VA                  Oakton High School
May 30      San Ramon, CA        California High School
June 6      Pittsburgh, PA        Pittsburgh Technical Institute
June 13      Wayne, NJ        Passaic County Tech
TBD      Atlanta, GA        TBD
TBD      San Diego, CA        TBD
TBD      St. Louis, MO        St. Louis Rams Facility
TBD      Boston, MA        TBD
TBD      Baltimore, MD        North County High School
TBD      Charlotte, NC        Carolina Panthers Facility
TBD      Rochester, NY        St. John Fisher College
TBD      Seattle, WA        Seattle Seahawks Facility
TBD      Denver, CO        TBD

For more details you can visit www.usafootball.com

My most recent interview has been with a great example of a guy that is passionate about football officiating and passionate about helping other officials excel. Tony Michalek has officiated in the NFL as an umpire since 2002. Prior to his professional career, Tony worked in teh Big 10 and spent 20 years on the high school fields in Chicago, Illinois.

Tony spoke in great length about video and using film to improve your officiating skills. As you probably know, I firmly believe film review is one of the most important and critical components of improvement at any level and preparing any official for moving up the ladder. Here is an excerpt from Tony’s interview. More of the details of Tony’s interview as well as the other veteran officials and supervisors are contained in my upcoming book “Ready For Play – A Comprehensive Guide to Football Officiating.” You can get more information on the book as well as get your name on the notification list by visiting www.profootballreferee.com/training

Here’s what Tony said about the importance of video review:

TONY: For the last three years as I’ve been going around the country for USA Football, and I’ve been going to clinics and speaking engagements, I tell high school football officials that it is easier than you think. And this is what I tell them to do: Each week, when you go to a high school game, when you go to the field, take a blank disk with you. It used to be the VHS tape. Take a blank disc with you with an envelope, with it addressed, with it stamped, and with a return address. And go a little bit early and ask to find whoever’s videotaping the game, ask the athletic director if you can get a copy of tonight’s game or today’s game. And give that to them and ask them if they would do that. Give it with a slip of paper with your email address or your phone number on there. So you have the paper, you have the blank disk in there and you have the envelope, and you give that to somebody you know that will be able to handle that. And it takes a little bit of work.

And have one person from the crew do that each week. And then if you rotate people that’s fine or if you just have one person all year, and have the crew chip in for the stamps and have the crew chip in for everything, the envelopes and the blank disks. And you can do that each and every week. And by the end of the year, you might work 30 games. And if you work 30 games you’ll probably only get back maybe 15 disks. So you’ve wasted a little bit of money but at the same time you’ve got 15 disks that you can train from. So you take the disks and as soon as you get them back you want to break it down. And you want to break it down; you want to look at your position. You don’t want to look at calls; the first thing you want to do is master your mechanics. And so you look at your positioning on the field. You look at your crewmates’ positioning on the field. As the play flows watch everybody’s position. Don’t be sitting there looking for calls: “Well, you know what? That was illegal motion. Ooh, that was a hold.” That’s not what we’re trying to do first.

The first objective is to be in the right spot to make the right calls. And so every single game I see that I could help myself in my positioning, to this day. It never changes. And so you can do that and that will make you better, it helps your judgment. Because if you’re in position you can have better judgment to make a better call. And so high school officials do have the opportunity. More and more games are being televised, too. Make sure that someone on the crew is taping it so you can get that. And if that isn’t the case, find out the cable company, offer to pay, send the disk and do what you have to do.

So there’s more and more opportunities for these younger officials. Now even these youth programs are taping the games. Ask for a copy. Just say “Here’s a blank disc, here’s the envelope, can you make a copy? Burn me a copy please.” And we’re getting more and more opportunities to do that and I think that nowadays officials can become better than we did in our young years because of the availability of this stuff.

TODD: Tony, I don’t believe in short cuts in anything, but can the use of video accelerate your learning faster than if you didn’t have it?

TONY: Absolutely. Absolutely.

TODD: Any idea…? Like you mentioned, if an official can obtain 15 of his 30 games, is that equivalent to maybe an extra year’s experience?

TONY: Every official’s different on how much they will accelerate the official, but it will absolutely make you a better official. Because what you’re going to do is you’re going to be seeing the plays, you’re going to see the position. Now you’re going to know. “You know what? Michalek kept telling me that I wasn’t getting to the goal line. I thought I was getting to the goal line; I kept kind of arguing with him in my head. You know what? I wasn’t at the goal line. I was only close. And then when I got to the goal line I was standing at the pylon instead of three or four yards out. Now I’ve been able to see it.” Now I can make myself better, because now I can visualize what I did wrong, because you really don’t see yourself. Now after watching the video I can see where I was, and then as you continue to watch video what happens is you have that mental imagery that sticks with you. You watch video, you watch the plays, you’re seeing an offensive pass interference, you see it, you see it, you see it on video. And a hundred times you’ve seen it on video, now the first time it happens live it’s like you’ve seen it for the 101^st time, not the first time.

I have a great example of that: Twenty-six years of officiating, I never saw an illegal forward back during a live football game in a game that I’ve officiated. I never saw one. I’ve seen it on video, I’ve been going to clinics since 1983, I’ve always seen illegal forward passes maybe on television. I’ve seen them at clinics, on video. I never saw one in a live football game. And the very first time I saw an illegal forward back in a football game live that I was officiating, Super Bowl XLII. So the thing about it was, as soon as it happened… It wasn’t my call. And I was ready to call it, if the linesman doesn’t call it and the line judge doesn’t call it. As soon as I saw it, it was like Boom! That’s an illegal forward pass. I said to myself, “I saw that thing a hundred times but never live.” But my mind, my head thought I’d seen it a hundred times. And so that’s why video today can accelerate an official’s growth.

TODD: That’s great. Yeah, and definitely I believe it’s… And I think it is getting better but it is so widely underutilized at the lower levels. I want to ask you one question: College film is often times easier to obtain. But I find that some of the high school associations shy away from showing college film for a various number of reasons. But do you think it’s useful to the high school level?

TONY: I think you have to be careful of what you show. I don’t like the fact that there is so much fragmentation between college and high school groups. We’re very mindful of it and we want to make sure we show something that’s relevant to the high school officials. And there are plenty of plays that are relevant. We’ve always shown college plays in our association in Chicago because it was the best video; it was the clearest and the best shots. But what we did was we made sure it was relevant to what we were doing at the high school game. And you know, there are certain rules that are different. So what you have to do is don’t show something that’s not going to happen in a high school game. Don’t show something that the rule’s completely different.

When you’re breaking down for your presentation make sure you pull out plays that are relevant. I don’t show… In our USA Football clinics I don’t’ show any NFL plays. None. And that’s because it’s not relevant. OPI on Randy Moss is a lot different than a 5’9” junior in high school. So for me to show “Yeah, this is OPI,” it’s a totally different deal. So we try not to do that. But I think at college, some of the college plays you can show and you just need… Whoever’s showing them though they need to be very careful and make sure it’s relevant for a high school official and they can use it.

You can visit USA Football’s website at www.usafootball.com

SEC Commissioner Rogers Redding and Big 10 veteran referee Bill LeMonnier are my next interviews. Stay tuned for more insider’s scoop at www.profootballreferee.com/blog