I played around with this a little to try to find the answer. If you exclude the exchanges, some of the closest examples I found were: Marrufo did four 4ths and then his first whistle in 2002. Anno did two 4ths and a line in 2001, then two more 4ths before his first whistle in 2002. Jesse Johnson had six 4ths in 2002 before getting his first whistle that season. Geiger had three 4ths in 2004 and then had his first whistle that season. Toledo has the exact same history as Geiger in this regard. Andrew Chapin had a 4th in 2003, three 4ths in 2004, then got his first whistle. Ben Jones had five 4ths before getting his first whistle in 2005. Jozef Batko had two 4ths in 2006, before getting his first whistle. Colin Tait had fourth 4ths in 2006, before getting his first whistle. Joe Caroccio did two 4ths in 2008, followed by his first whistle (I don't remember this guy at all--was he an exchange?) Edvin Jurisevic had two 4ths in 2008, followed by his first whistle. Then these four examples are pretty extreme, but not quite there: Abbey Okulaja, who had one 4th at the beginning of the 2003 season and then had his first whistle a month later Hector Tobon, who had ran a line on a match in 2003 and then had his first whistle. Lee Suckle who had one 4th in 2005 and then had his first whistle a month later. Jeff Gontarek had one 4th in 2008, followed by his first whistle that season. But the apparent winner actually makes a ton of sense: Maurico Navarro's first match was a whistle in 2006. (By comparison, Petrescu, and DePiero also had whistles that year, but both had a 4th first so would fall into the category above).
Oh, Navarro! That makes perfect sense. Would have been a year or two before TFC started playing but after the expansion announcement. Anyway, here's what Joe Caroccio is up to these days: http://www.miamifc.com/coaching-staff/joe-caroccio
I'm with MassRef here. That play basically goes down like this: da Fonte tries to hold Dempsey to slow/stop his run; Dempsey does a swim to try to clear it; but, Dempsey being Dempsey (you take the bad with the good), he puts a little extra on the swing and makes contact above the shoulder. That little extra is likely what turned it into a red card and I don't think there's any way to defend it really. I even pulled it up on my phone to show the highlight to people around me at the game and few argued after that. That said, the lack of VR on the first incident with Bruin in the penalty area is completely baffling to me. Then again, as has been discussed here ad nauseam, the implementation of VR has been baffling throughout. I thought it was used effectively for both RCs, but Penso clearly went to his ear on the Bruin appeal and the VAR clearly told him there was nothing worth looking at, but the replays look to show Bruin being dragged down by his shoulder/neck right around the penalty spot. -- Edit: Here's the Bruin incident, in case anyone missed the first post with the highlight Looks an awful like @wbruin was dragged down, but VAR doesn't look at this one. pic.twitter.com/SZOvZm9yKu— Sounder At Heart (@sounderatheart) October 22, 2017 -- Fans need to understand what's happening, because nobody around me did and nobody understands why (to that point in the match) the Dempsey incident is reviewed but the other isn't.
As said, all this is constantly evolving and different personalities are going to lead to different results (just as they would without VAR!). I'll refrain from harping on my point that "clear and obvious" on subjective decisions is always going to be, well, subjective. But in an attempt to make some sense of the current madness... The pattern seems to be that red cards for VC are easier to give via VR than penalties. When an elbow or an off-the-ball incident or a hand-to-the-face during a mass confrontation gets caught on camera, it seems or feels like VARs have no hesitation referring such incidents to the CR because--and I'm speculating here--often times this is the sort of thing we miss, we know we miss, and we second guess ourselves. Imagine an internal conversation in one of your matches like this: "Did he really get elbowed in the face? It looked like something might have happened but I had no angle. [player stays down until next stoppage] Oh crap, he's bleeding, I missed it. But there's nothing I can do. This sucks." Those are exactly the sort of plays that referees want to look at a second time. And VARs, being referees, know that. So they send these incidents down. Penalties are a different story. As referees we are always making affirmative decisions. It's not just "yes, that's a penalty" but also "no, that's not a penalty." It's rarer to have the "oh crap, I was screened and didn't see that well" moment with penalties. Now, when those do occur and the foul was obvious, there will be a review (I think Toledo had one like this in Vancouver, if memory serves). But we've already seen a few situations where it looks like a foul almost certainly happened, but the VAR didn't send down the clip for review. And I would suggest that's because VARs are used to the idea that we make a ton of decisions in the penalty area and for a penalty to be awarded after a referee says it wasn't, it has to truly be clear and obvious. It has to be the sort of penalty that is always given--not just one that is now pretty clear on replay. It goes back to the notion, written into the Laws now, of what "football expects." The same sort of logic seems to be applying for most VARs with potential SFP tackles that receive yellow cards on the field (though the adjudication of those has been more erratic). Now, I say all that and won't argue it's right. I think it's an inherent flaw in the VAR system. But based on how things have worked so far, I'm not surprised at all that Dempsey was sent off and a penalty wasn't awarded for Bruin being held. Dempsey threw an elbow that the referee had no chance of seeing and would love to get a second look at. Bruin was involved in a coming together in the penalty area that might have been a foul and might not have been, but the referee made an immediate judgment call and probably didn't want to revisit it unless the VAR determined he missed something glaring. That really isn't consistent with the notion of correcting all clear and obvious errors, but it seems to be where we are right now.
He put his hand to his ear, no?while helpful, I'd like to see a signal introduced that indictates "I know you want VAR, I have used VAR, and VAR confirmed I don't need to change anything." Something like a long whistle, followed by the TV rectangle, then a no good field goal signal, then a wave to throw the ball in (or whatever).
My conspiracy theory, which I think is true--Navarro was used in MLS because CONCACAF kept assigning him to MLS teams in their Champions League (or whatever they used to call it), and he was known for essentially favoring the Central American teams, like the rest of the CONCACAF refs. So the thought was if they got him in MLS games, he'd have familiarity with the players, and would realize where his bread was buttered, so to speak. In fact, I think they hastily assigned him a game in DC quickly before a CONCACAF assignment there, but my memory is that one of those two games ended up getting pulled. Needless to say, Navarro stayed...difficult until the end.
He did. And fans seemed to be tuned in to that. And, yes, a signal would be helpful. But fans got the idea. That's not my issue. My issue is that a potential penalty is a game-changing decision, that fans see the VR process as an attempt to get game-changing decisions right, and that a case of a close or questionable penalty decision (for or against) seems to fans (and, frankly, to me*) like something that should be reviewed. There needs to be more clarity around this and there needs to be a campaign to communicate how it all works. -- *Seriously, I would have LOVED to have been able to look again at penalties I called or waved away. That Bruin one is one where I could see myself thinking in real time that it was a simple coming together and then seeing on replay that the defender had the attacker collared and pulled him down.
But VAR is not about getting "close or questionable" calls right; VAR is about fixing clear errors. At least now. We'll see where the slippery slope goes. And every PK or plausible PK is reviewed. It just isn't reviewed on the field unless the VAR thinks there is a clear error. That, I think, is the disconnect with fans (and likely players).