Went to Chanute today, very good and organized tournament , on time and setup well. But the only thing im seeing and this is a big problem with the young refs not doing their job correctly. Ive seen many mistakes thats cost my kids and others kids matches due to the lack of these young kids reffing just really not caring or not totally knowing what they are doing, they are actually kinda lazy. do they have to go through training for this ? Because when your talking about your kid finishing 5th or worst cause of 2 badly called matches, when they coulda got 1st or at least 2nd . it makes a big deal to me and other parents. Any body have any insite on this?

Don't waist your time on trying to fix this! That's the best advice you can get. If you do, in the end you'll just be disappointed. You might as well just sit in your corner and never protest a call beacuse the ref will just say " it's a judgement call." Then no matter how diplomatic or accomodating you are the ref will not change his mind even if he is wrong. You could bring out a book and show the rules to him and it still won't make a difference and by this time you probably have already been warned and the moment you say anything you'll get kicked out ( depending on your status with the district your in). You can get the head ref but he's probably buddies with the ref your trying to convince and in the end there not going to turn on there own kind. In fact just today i had a ref go out of his way to come to my corner and intentionaly try to get me to say something so he could kick me out. If I followed a ref to the middle of the mat and provoked him after he walked away and tried to avoid conflict I would be kicked out but the ref can do whatever he wants and USAWK will back him 100%.
Believe me someone who has been through it all. Sit in your corner watch them make mistakes bite your tounge and when you go out of state enjoy the great refs that are not affiliated with your local chapter of USA wrestling. The abuse of the rules amongst refs is staggering and every year it gets worse. Say what you will but I say never leave the match in the hands of a ref. Go out and take care of business and get out while you still have your coaches card. I love this sport but sometimes we take more steps backwards than forwards when it comes to this problem. Just my thoughts and I'm sure everyone has there own opinion. I will say for every bad ref there is usally a good one right around the corner, but everyone remembers the bad ones.

I seen a head ref over turn a call today that changed the winner of a match!!
It was awesome!

you mean that they aren't all evil? here's an idea, become a ref!

jason & CBRs Dad.....3 words for ya....
GO GET CERTIFIED...

The refs give alot of personnal time let alone taking off from their jobs. For alot of them it is their passion for the love of the sport. Many were wrestlers themselves. Until you walk a mile in their shoes, PLEASE....do not bad mouth the refs. Without them the whistle wouldn't blow, and your son wouldn't wrestle! IF you don't care to get certified, go buy some popcorn!

HIS MAMA, You know refs do generly love this sport but this is not something they do for free. Thier not bell ringers donating time without being paid. They do get paid now I'm not saying they don't love the sport and what they do isn't a hard. But they are being paid which leaves the jobs they do an open to critisism. Like it or not. And some are better than others.

And far as most all were refs wrestlers I think at this point that myth sets right there with all exotic dancers are putting themselves thru Law School, Med school

It is a job that they get paid for. Every job I have had has an evaluation process every year and if your doing good you get to keep your job and maybe a raise. If you suck you get demoted or fired. Why should this job be any different?!

I was at Chanute today as well and I'll bet there was around 150 "bad" calls, easily. Can you believe that? 150 "bad" calls! There was 5 age groups, 6U 8U 10U 12U & 14U and I don't remember the final bout numbers but let's say each age group had 100 matches. That's 500 total matches. Now let's say each match goes 3 periods. Thats 1,500 periods*. Now let's assume that a Ref makes an average of 3 call each period (I think this is a low number but it's a round number). We are now at 4,500 "judgement" calls in a tournament. And we have already established that 150 of them were bad so that makes the ref's correct 96% of the time.

Maybe it's just me but I'll take 96% all day long, even if my kid ends up on the 4% side from time to time. My kids just started wrestling last year so I don't have years of expirence to draw from but I would like to say thanks too all of the tournament directors, the table workers, the towel tappers, concession workers, and especially the refs. Without you there is no place for my kids to wrestle each weekend.

Theres no such thing as a bad bad call? Why ever had your son wrestling a match and ref gives point and in your own mind you go "Well cool that one went are way" and 3 weeks later your calling the ref to the table and asking "How can you give that kid points for that Judgment call my butt" Some you get, some get you. And it'll never be the way you need it when you get that call. I teach my kids "You never leave it up to a REF they'll screw you everytime." If you lose a match by 1 cause you didn't get the escape work hard and maybe next time it won't be that close.

Thank you Shak!

You know who complains about bad refs? Poor coaches with average kids....its always the ref....not the kid or the coach. Grow up and get better!

Thumbs up!

While I do agree you should never allow the match to stay close enough that 1 bad call decides the match. My concern with inexperienced refs is injuries. Today at JOCO I watched a kids leg get torqued past 90 degrees and the ref never called potentially dangerous, he just watched it. I also saw the same ref watch a kid stand up with another kid figure foured around the head(with his head toward the mat),not only was this not ruled potentially dangerous and stopped but the kids head was driven into the mat pile driver style. Not only was that not stopped even then the ref watched until he decided 2 points control.Unfortunately, the only good out of that scenario was niether wrestler was on my team. This same ref last year watched 1 of my wrestlers get his leg torqued on a single until his ACL tore. At least he learned,right? I have this ref this year,I will run out&stop the match myself if there is an injury in waiting.

what makes this job different than the one you do currently is this.

- you applied
- you qualified
- you were chosen
- you suck
- YOU ARE REPLACED
with me so far??? your words not mine, btw. i was called earlier in the week by the head referee at chanute to come ref. i had a previous engagement, could not. so they scrambled, to find replacements.
still with me???
here it comes, THERE ARE FEW REPLACEMENTS, unlike your prestigious job where someone is waiting in the wings to step in. after reffing for 1 year, i will tell you it's tough, at times, but like anything else you get better with experience.

how many of you, are better at your job after 10 years than you were when you started???

i wouldn't mind having and evaluation, but are you all willing to pay an extra $5 to $10 per entry fee to cover the expense of that salary? maybe each club in the state could throw in from their profits to cover it. seriously think about that, you would need a head ref, plus an auditor at every tournament, every weekend.

how about we promote people who have never been a referee or a wrestler to be the auditor. isn't that the way your job is? don't you all just love it, at your job, when you get a new boss, 25 yrs old, fresh out of college, never worked a day in his life. don't you like it when a customer calls and chews your a**! maybe it should be like the Major League Baseball all-star balloting, the fans vote, no flaws in that system. How about Kansas Wrestling go out and recruit the BCS they get it right all the time. don't they?

great discussions here, please keep coming up with good solutions, contact will cokeley (chairman of the Referee Educational Forum and Evaluation and Review committee), and don't forget to attend the state meeting and place your votes.

all kidding aside here people, i do think we need some sort of education, evaluation, and promotion process, but i haven't seen anyone including cokeley do anything but bring it up. let's here some ideas that will work, let's put the whole thing in motion. stop complaining, stop waiting for someone else to take over, step up, and take it on. if you settle for what you have, you deserve what you get.

dang it! she said she was going to enroll, right after her plastic surgery!!! well then, i'm going to go to the casino and give THEM my $$$ from now on. at least all of THEIR profits go to education.

there's the good ol' HA beeson, i thought you went soft on me. I saw you posting on a ranking thread, us HAs don't care about rankings. right pres?

I agree with HEADUP!
The forum has been a lil bland lately...
Its nice to see some good Ol Chad Spice this last week or so!
Welcome back HA Beeson!
Lol

I have always thought that if a ref makes a call that impacts you kid wining or losing, that kid should have not let it be that close.

However when you are talking about two very good kids wrestling each other that may not always apply, but it is the same for everybody.

A quote from Goddard this weekend:

"Yea I think I screwed up and made a pretty bad call"

From a younger ref, and it didn't impact the outcome because the kids went ahead and took care of it on his own.

We are ALL human....Refs, coaches, kids, and parents!! Everyone makes mistakes. Yesterday at goddard, a coach asked for the head ref, after a bad call. The ref was young and unsure of the true definition of an escape. The head ref came over explained it to him and the call was overturned..It was the right call.......Now keep one thing in mind, these young refs are the future..look around the mats...some of these guys aren't getting any younger..The young ones will catch on. Local tournaments aren't qualifiers, they are tough practices getting ready for a bigger picture. One bad call isn't the end of the world..I'm just as guilty as the next guy, on questioning a call...just don't loose sleep over it or mull it over and over, learn from it and fix it at the next tournament.

uh most of these KIDS arent old enough to work , probably hung over from a party the night before