Bad call? Refs must guard against listening to loud off-field
I continue to be amazed at the lengths that teams will go to in order to "win." Coaching players from the sidelines has always been a problem, but what about when players are coaching the refs?
Sometimes you're just hearing harmless outbursts from the crowd, directed at a referee rather than a player. Other times the yells are from a team, trying to tip the odds in their favor by either distracting you or turning your attention toward their opponents. All you can do is keep your focus.
"Ref, he's hit on his head! Check him!"
You hear a variant of this all the time. What the heck's a ref to do? You don't take paint check orders from the sidelines, and you certainly don't want the comment to alter the course of the game, but you wonder if the player's actually hit or not.
Unfortunately, there are many rules relating to this situation, but none may apply to the instance you're dealing with!
1) First of all, don't try to take action against someone during a game for a comment like that. If they were coaching the player and the rules don't allow it, that's a different story; some rules say you can eliminate him and penalize the team. You have to be totally sure that the one making the coaching comment is actually helping him or affiliated with his group. The guy coaching him could be on the opposing team trying to get the player in trouble. It's a real mess either way.
The best advice I can give you is to hear the ref-related comment, act like you're ignoring it, yet glance in that direction and try to determine if they're right! It sounds weird, I know, but teams observing the situation are going to raise a stink if they think you're responding to the audience.
Let's say that many comments like the one described above are yelled during a game. Ignore the comments, and focus on what you're doing. After the game, make an announcement regarding the situation and see if it improves. If it does not, ask an off-field ref to watch the audience the next several games and try to determine who is causing the disturbance. If they are mainly from one team, then you can give them a penalty under sideline coaching: ref's discretion. They will argue that they aren't coaching any players, but your call can go against them, that they are trying to alter the outcome of the game.
2) What's the best way to deal with a team that takes coaching a ref to the next level? We've all had this happen at one time or another. A player or team walks up to you in between games and tells you that they think a player or entire team is cheating. They might describe how the players are cheating, point out specific ones, or even name names.
The referee keeps his focus on the game. He does not let
OK, it's confession time. A team tried this with me recently and it worked! Here's how they did it. They came to me as a group after a game and told me all about a team they thought was being dishonest. They said this other team had players who were playing on, wiping, the works. They pointed out a specific player, one I'd been watching all day-because I thought he played really good! They stroked my ego a bit, said that they were surprised because I'm supposed to be this experienced ref and this guy was doing all these bad things right in front of me. To make things worse, I had admitted to them that I was watching that team and specifically that player all day because I was entertained by their skill.
The next time the accused team took the field, I was watching them like a hawk. (So this team's accusers had already influenced me to change the way that I am reffing their opponents. Imagine how useful that could be when they play their accusers!) I was on that one player like glue, the whole time driven by the thought that I've missed a whole string of cheats right before my eyes. He takes one in the headband, quickly pats it, looks at his hand, and makes an aggressive move just as I am ripping his armband. He did not shoot. Would he have shot if I weren't there? No one knows, but it was a poor coincidence that he made that aggressive move because it cemented in my mind that his accusers were probably right.
It's finals time, and guess who's playing who? My mind is on catching a cheater on the accused team, not where it should be. The game plays out to a firestorm of controversy at the 50. The accusing team is at their game of deceit and calling for extreme, game-altering points changes. I won't bore you with the details, but we got lucky. What I didn't see, my other refs did, and we sorted out a complete picture and proved the accusing team to be flat-out lying.
Their true colors ran through as they walked back onto the field and declared to the refs how they were going to cheat in this game, daring us to catch them. Well, they didn't cheat, and we weren't focused on them, either. I learned my lesson the first time. Be secure in your experience, and knowledge of the game. Listen to what people have to say, but don't let them alter the way you do your job. Get in the zone and stay focused!
Marc Gottfried has been playing the sport with Total Greif Paintball Team (totalgreif.com) since 1989 and his home field is Xtreme Paintball Park, Millstadt, Illinois (xtremepaint ballpark.com). Marc is a world champion brewmaster who operates a state-of-the-art brewery/nightclub in St. Louis, Missouri (morganstreetbrewery.com). Got a question about reffing for Marc? marc@actionpursuitgames.com.
