Missed Calls

This is a great topic, and one that can be thought about a little differently. We always hear, "You missed that call!" Sometimes the commentor is 100% correct, and when they are, you agree with them. It happens. More times than not, we don't agree with them. Then, the commentor can be ignored or considered an idiot, depending on how you feel.

But how often do the players, coaches, and fans have a legitimate gripe? More often than any of us think. NBA officials average about 93% correct on their calls according to their exhaustive review of films and evaluations. That means the best in the world, who watch every game film with evaluators and officiate as a full-time job, will miss 7% of the time. D-1 college guys are probably a little less. High school? I'd guess you can range from the low 80's to the 70's. The point is, we all miss more than we think we do. It's OK. We can just admit it.

The only missed calls are the ones you admit that you missed.

Some calls are very easy. Grandma in the top row at Art Dawald can see that the kid drove in and got tackled. All of us get that 99% of the time. However, we've all choked. We've all, for some reason, just not seen it the right way, or just didn't process the play fast enough to hit the whistle and call the foul. So while you'd get this play 99% of the time, you might miss it 1%. That's also probably when you'd admit that you missed one. You want your parnter to help you. You'll also thank him for it.

Most calls are not that easy. On a simple drive to the basket, there is contact. How much information do we have to process in a short period of time? Tons. You have to decide if the driver beat his man on the play and earned the right to get to the bucket without BSQR being disrupted, or if the defender (either primary of secondary) earned his position by using his skills. Was the contact in the torso? Was in initiated by the offensive player? Was the defender straight-up or leaning? Was a piece of the ball gotten first, and the contact was incidental because the shooter was off-balance or looking to draw the foul, or did the defender have to make contact in order to get to the ball? There are several other ones, too. By the way, you have about 2 seconds to see, process, and decide. And this happens on every competitive matchup during a game!

It's harder to admit that you missed these. There are calls that are fairly obvious, and you call those 80-90% of the time. There are 50-50 calls, that can really go either way--should I pass or not--and that is at your discretion. Then there are the calls that are less obvious. When you call them, they usually result in the crowd, the coaches, and/or the players getting pissy. And when you get them right, it is a good feeling. Almost euphoric. You're showing your skills as an official.

What's the point to all of this? The only way you can continue to improve your judgment is to listen to the feedback associated with your calls. If you are passing on a lot of those 80-90%, you might be letting them play too much. If you think you are getting a lot of those tough calls that nobody else sees or "has the balls" to call, and the players and coaches are stupid for reacting to several of them in a short period of time, you might be trying to force things. When you have good judgment, there is the correct balance of getting the right percentage of obvious calls, and making the tougher, less frequent calls. And you'll know this because your partners, the players, coaches, will typically understand. Even the astute fans will get it, too. It's called "credibility".

That feedback, as unpleasant as it can be at times, can be used to make you better, if you can be open enough to admit you make mistakes--much like players and coaches do when they see films. We're all in the same game.

I'll never say someone missed a call, unless they acknowledge they did. However, if the perception of the masses is that a call was missed, the whole crew is responsible for not getting it. And everyone can learn from that feedback from time to time.