I don't know if it's possible to come up with a subjective method to rate
officials.  There is a lot of emotion involved when fans watch their favorite
team play, and any official who calls penalties against that team, no matter how
justified they may be, is likely to be branded a "bad ref" by many of those
fans.  Depending on the game and the teams playing it, an official is likely to
be remembered by different people as good or bad, or not even remembered at all.
And fans have long memories, at least for the "bad" refs.
 
Now, I actually *like* Harry Ammian.  I know there have been a lot of complaints
(and not just over the past few days) about his propensity for messing up calls,
but whenever I've seen him do a game, I've generally left happy, or at least not
upset, with the officiating.  On the other hand, I can't help but get a sinking
feeling whenever I see Marty McDonough's name in the program.  I just don't care
for his style of officiating, and haven't for several years.  Yet other people
consider him a good ref.
 
Let's keep in mind where college hockey would be without officials, i.e.
nowhere.  There are probably certain incompetent clowns who, assuming capable
replacements are available (an assumption that isn't always valid), should be
dumped as quickly as possible.  Maybe the question is what do we really *want*
from the officials, aside from the obvious "let my team win" :-)  I think the
following are worthwhile considerations when evaluating an official:
 
1.  Knowledge of the rule book.
Well, duh.  But more often than I would like, I see things like icing being
called on a team that's killing a penalty; or someone being called for a minor
and misconduct and the official failing to have another member of the team go to
the box to serve the minor; or faceoffs being held in the wrong spot; or other
silly things like these that are clearly addressed in the rule book.  OK, the
officials are human, and they can forget like the rest of us.  But when I see a
guy out there fumbling through situation after situation, I tend to get very
irritated, whether it's adversely affecting my team or not.  The officials are
out there to interpret and enforce the rules, and it's difficult to do that
without knowing them in the first place.
 
2.  Consistency
If it's hooking when one team does it, it better be hooking when the other team
does the same thing.  More to the point, if it's hooking in the first period, it
damn well better be hooking in the third period.  It's no fun watching or
playing a game in which officials are making ticky-tack calls, but if they are
at least *consistently* making ticky-tack calls, you can adjust.  If they're all
over the map, sometimes letting things go and other times coming down hard, the
game has no real flow, and players and fans alike get frustrated.  I'm also not
fond of the practice of backing off in the third period of a close game, "so the
players can decide it."  Some officials seem to be afraid of making that late
call that "decides" a game.  Well, by *not* making it, aren't they also deciding
the game, by letting something go that was a penalty earlier?
 
3.  Don't try to be the center of attention
Whenever the discussion of "worst ref" comes up on HOCKEY-L, one name from the
ECAC invariably gets mentioned, though in his case a more accurate title might
be "most hated ref".  I think this fellow may have retired, since I haven't
heard much, if anything, about him the past couple of seasons, but in his
heyday, you never knew what was going to happen when he worked a game.  His
officiating was actually pretty decent, as long as that was what he focused on,
but there were any number of occasions when he would start grandstanding and get
into verbal confrontations with players (French Canadians in particular),
coaches, and even a band once.  I suspect to this day, most fans in the ECAC
swear this guy had a personal vendetta against their team.  I am speaking, of
course, of Pierre Belanger.  He was capable of calling a good game, and did do
so a number of times, but too often the "other stuff" would start happening, and
the game would go right out the window.  I imagine it's tough to accept, but an
official can't improve a game by calling attention to himself; he can only
detract from it.
 
I look at my considerations, and I realize I've probably described Marty
McDonough.  Fine, but I still don't like him :-)
 
--
Disclaimer -- Unless otherwise noted, all opinions expressed above are
              strictly those of:
 
Bill Fenwick
Cornell '86 and '95
LET'S GO RED!!                                                  DJF  5/27/94
"I got a new house.  I sold my old house for $85,000... boy, was my landlord
 pissed."
-- Garry Shandling
 
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