As I think I mentioned earlier, I'm actually going to two regionals (or playoffs as they're now officially known) this year; the first I was a skating official, this second an alternate. I really didn't think I'd have anything to write. Really, do you want to hear about how I sat down, watched a game, occasionally walked into the center for an official review or timeout, then told the announcers what it was and the result?

Since in many ways this was my first regionals all over again (new sport), I went back and compared the notes I wrote (literally, on an old Apple Newton) and compared them with my experience this last weekend. And there are several similarities and differences:
Similarities:
* Chance to get better games if you perform well
* High pressure, high stakes games
* Some nice comrade with the other officials
But there were some big differences, too.

I'm actually going to two regional tournaments (officially playoffs) this year; I did last year but didn't write anything because it would have entailed "I kept track of score" and "I wrote down penalties on a small whiteboard" and repeated several times. Chances are I'll be skipping writing about the upcoming playoff/regional because I'm an alternate, and as such won't be doing a lot, except watching a buttload of games during the weekend.

Wow, this was an interesting day. Some ups and downs, but mostly ups. My crew worked the consolation bracket today, which, while not exactly glory matches, they are extremely important to the teams and demand no less than our best. And good thing, too - because our first match was a doozy. We had 49 majors called in the bout - not trips to the box (where four minors would get you sent there), but majors - from what I gather (I hadn't thought of it before), a typical bout has something like the low to middle 20s.

For the tournament I'm doing Outside Pack Reffing. There's a minor problem with roller derby - it's not that outside pack reffing isn't important; it's just that it could be said that the other positions are just "more equal" than OPR - honestly, it's much like Assistant Referees in soccer; when you have good OPRs things can go absolutely awesome, and the inside refs appreciate the heck out of them and it can turn a well-reffed bout into an awesomely reffed-bout.

NOTE: I know several of you have stated that you really don't care when I write about that other sport I referee. If that's the case for you, you can safely skip this series of entries. This blog still has the same purpose as always (self-evaluation and venting when necessary), but it won't be focused on footy for a while, as for me this is the soccer off-season.

You would think, with the economy sucking as much as it does, that more people, even those who previously retired, might don stripes and referee. High School soccer pays pretty decent (I'd get $40-$45 a center for high-school ages at the club level - high schools pay close to $70), but I've been getting emails, and now texts, from assignors desperate for officials - and just not getting them.

So, since most of my readers are soccer people, a little background on how things work in the roller derby world. As of the day I write this, there are 1055 roller derby leagues world-wide; there are 124 leagues in the Women's Flat Track Derby Association covering the US, Canada, Scotland, and England, which is the gold-standard for roller derby leagues - both in operations and in quality of play.

This is probably my last game for the season. Not because I'm quitting, but just because I'm not working high school games again. I would have loved to have tried college, but it became clear that you needed to either be a State referee or a woman to be considered (sorry, it's true - all of the male referees I've seen working college games were State, National, or State Emeritus referees - women were all of those, but also included sevens and eights.

One of the things I really like about reffing roller derby is that we have a crew, and we work together all season. And when the players practice, we practice (if not reffing scrimmages, then working on skills, rules knowledge, situations, etc.). Last year when I became the assistant head referee (and I don't want to be the head - been there done that - this lets me pick and choose what I want to do), I decided I wanted to take an active role in new referee training.

I really didn't want to be assessed - not because I don't like assessments, I do. I've had one informal assessment that went very badly (although the assessor got put into a defensive and argumentative posture before he even got to me - to the point where he was arguing things that aren't supposed to be up for debate), but otherwise I've learned a lot about them.

When a player has a bad day, they may be allowed some leeway to get back into the game. But referees? Not so much. Work has been crazy (50-60 hours weeks lately), and I couldn't get to a bank before it closed to get the proper amount to pay my assistants; so they got an extra $5 each and I ended up getting shorted because I had to use an ATM.

OK, this happens every year and I'm not sure why the center referee was so uptight about it. So, of the two adult leagues that I (and most of us in this area, actually) work with, the men's league has all their games at one steady time, barring venue restrictions; the women's league does the same, except their game start is 15 minutes later than the men's typical time - except 2/3 into the season, they move all the games up 15 minutes to deal with earlier sunsets.

It's been a few more days since I started thinking about ending it. I'm still thinking seriously about it, but I've been able to clarify a few things:
First, I think the reason I took this so hard wasn't the insult, but the type of insult. God knows I've had abuse thrown at me before, but this was the first time it was directed at my integrity.

I usually wait a period of weeks or months before posting an entry, but I thought, since I'm not going to add a ton of commentary (see all my rants about NFHS sprinked throughout the over 900 entries posted here), and since high school soccer is just about ready to start for a good chunk of the US, I thought I'd just post a summary to this link:
Is New Soccer Uni Regulation a Whitewash?