Background: I've been a ref since 2008 at different events with different ref crews and head refs. Before that I was a student on a team for three years (Hi Alicen!), including time on the drive team.
I appreciate the sentiment from the OP, but I think it's perfectly reasonable and understandable for people to post questions about close calls. Most of the discussion is constructive, and as a ref I'm interested to see how the rules are interpreted by teams.
That said, in many posts relating to questionable calls, I see comments like "refs don't care about the teams" or the idea that refs are out to call as many fouls as possible. FIRST is a big place, but I've never met a ref with that attitude. From the refs I've volunteered with, I get the same attitude: I want teams to succeed. I want them to play fairly. I want to give teams who have put in the effort to understand the rules the game they deserve. And I hate when penalties swing a close match.
At the same time, I'm not perfect. I'm not a professional -- although I do put in hours of training and take time off work because I believe in FIRST's values. Have I missed calls this year (and other years)? Absolutely. Did I miss a few crossings over a few hundred matches (not even counting the poorly designed sally port)? Yes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by headlight
However, I think the instances of the refs changing a call are significantly rarer than the refs making a poor call.
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After the match is over, this is probably true. In most cases, changing a call means replaying a match, which is suboptimal for everybody involved (not that a bad call is optimal). And when games have lots of fouls, sometimes you don't even remember what foul you called a few minutes before, much less all the circumstances. At the same time, what people don't see are the internal discussions where a foul isn't assessed, or refs reconsidering a scenario during a match and deciding to "un-call" a penalty. I've flagged things, entered a foul, and then thought for a few seconds before deciding it was legal or ambiguous enough to give the benefit of the doubt.
One last thing, to those who say that people don't target refs personally or that refs aren't driven away because of negative reactions: Several years ago, I was at an event where we DQed an alliance in an elimination match because the rules were strict that year and that's what they prescribed. It was a close call, and the head ref (and the rest of the crew) were booed from the stands. Shortly afterwards a couple CD threads were started attacking the refs for the call. The experience contradicted everything FIRST stands for (although the team later apologized), and if it had been my first year I definitely wouldn't have come back.
It isn't being thin-skinned to be affected when people tell you you're doing a bad job. And even less so when you're doing that job because you want students and this organization to succeed.