Last eval of the year. Losing coach: "You did a good job." Referee coach (OK): "I was impressed. You have potential to go further."
It gets better. The SRC + PRO/FIFA Referees + (someone else) had a dinner later that night and my Referee Coach who won the Referee Coach of the Year for Region III was gushing about my performance and game that night. That someone in attendance? Kari Seitz
Some of the guys here want to do some training together in preparation for national camp. The last two weeks of November, I did nothing. The week before I did a scrimmage and two light workouts. My fitness was down from too many college games and my legs were way off balanced due to all of the college ARs. December 1st I started working out again to rebuild my muscles evenly and get my endurance back. I figured I'd do 5 laps easily focus through the next 2-3 and struggle the last 2-3. Turns out I'm in better shape than I thought. The only runs I struggled with were the 2 where I wasn't at the start line and the 4 where I was picking up the cones on the last lap. LFG!
Finally confirmed that my game on Saturday was my last of the year, so I have my year-end stats! Total games: 213 Total pay: $17,157.05 Games by position: Referee: 110 (avg. $98.07) AR: 92 (avg. $64.45) Fourth Official: 11 (avg. 33.18) Games by age: Adult Open: 49 Adult Over 30: 3 High School: 38 (managed to get away with only doing 4 JV games!) U18/19: 31 U17: 22 U16: 26 U15: 18 U14: 9 U13: 8 U10: 2 U8: 1 College: 6 Most frequent leagues: USYS: 39 (including state cup and regionals) High School: 38 MLS Next: 30 Local mens leagues: 30 ECNL: 27 UPSL: 16 NCAA: 6 Seriously hoping for a steep decline in game count next year...
Ah this is the person who used to run a “female referee program” for the cal north referee association, guess that’s why she doesn’t anymore
Since the MLS season is over, most domestic leagues are on winter break and the few WC qualifiers won’t restart until March, 2026, I realize historically that the boards here are going to be quiet late in the year. However, the reality is that the participation on the boards has declined considerably over the past 5 years and wanted to express my gratitude for having this venue before it’s “too late”. Many moons ago, I stumbled on the referee portion of BigSoccer after being an avid poster on the old “MetroStars” forum and then “NY Red Bulls” (now dead as the fans created their own website) and then discovered this one after becoming a USSF referee. As a newbie referee, it was great to have somewhere to go to ask questions about something happening in your game and receiving honest feedback. In other cases, pre-Twitter and pre-Instagram, it was great venue to see a play that happened in a domestic league match earlier in the day and get everyone’s feedback once I got home after my own matches based on the LOTG and see why the call was correct/incorrect. I’m hoping that same enthusiasm will be regenerated once the WC starts in June. I have always said that this forum was more helpful to me than the old-school yearly recerts, asking questions to well-meaning “experienced” referees who were not capable to answer my detailed questions or assignors who didn’t want to be bothered. This is the only forum I’m still familiar with where you can post videos of certain plays and discuss them at length. I hope I’m wrong and it’s around WAY after my days are over. Wishing all of my colleagues and their families a Happy New Year!
and I remember the old referee ListServe which one question about a play would generate about a thousand emails in reply
As a new middle-aged referee, I joined SOCREF-L in 1997. In my early years there, I downloaded a lot of old posts from people who seemed to know what they were talking about--like Jim Allen, among others. The oldest of my downloads date back to 1996. I don't doubt that SOCREF-L went back further, but as of 1997 only a year or so of old messages could be downloaded.
I agree with you on the value of this forum. Part of the lack of activity stems from the "be careful what you post on social media" narrative. It's certainly wise to be careful what you post, but nowadays there is such a fear about what you say being used against you many people have chosen it's better not to say anything at all.
In those early days, referee instruction resources were extremely limited. All you typically got was a Laws of the Game book at your entry level class. There were some documents that you heard about but nobody had ever seen. Jim Allen's site was independent of USSF and, therefore, controversial. There were some USSF big wigs that were lurkers and our discussions there led to an official "Questions and Answers" document, with some of the text taken from List Server discussions. I remember reading the Advice to Referees book when it first came out. I read one paragraph and thought "Boy, that sure sounds familiar," and later realized that I had actually written that explanation. And the Advice book led to FIFA putting a lot of the additional materials that is now in TLOTG. I still sometimes tell the life story of David Albany. What a cowboy he was. "Read and re-read the book until you almost have it memorized. Then throw it in the trash compactor and go out and referee."
I seem to recall Jim saying that his sites, which became sanctioned by USSF at some point, and the ATR were in part to get clear answers for some places that socref was giving out bad advice. Despite its flaws, the ATR was a fantastic resource when I returned to refereeing 20 years ago.
I found a couple in an old box just the other day in the attic. One is 1989. The other is a year or two off that. We got them with our badge in the mail every year for a bit. They're tapped up with clear packaging tap so that they held up in the bottom of my bag. I don't recall once ever opening it at the fields, but I felt the need to carry it probably because my instructor, Al Povey, told me to.
To be frank, I never found Jim Allen's site useful at all. I never submitted a question since you are at his mercy whether or not it would be published. While I recall it having a search bar to see previous questions on topics, that was really it from an "educational standpoint". My recollection is that once he removed the USSF logo, his answers began being more snarky and in some alarming cases either misleading or outright wrong.
There was one year when USSF was just a handful of people. They subcontracted sending out the books, badges and ID cards. They, apparently, went with the low bid. A large percentage of the labels came off in the mail. IIRC, something like 25%. That meant that the Postal Service returned them all to USSF. USSF was appealing for referees in the Chicago area to come spend time at Soccer House to open the envelopes, see whose stuff was inside and relabel the envelopes. What a mess! Somewhat similarly, I know of one frequent instructor who gave out badges at his entry level classes, but never filed any of the paperwork with the state office. He was making photocopies of the Laws of the Game book for the students. He just kept the money the students had paid for the class and their registration fees. This went on for two or three years before anyone seems to have noticed.
It was my understanding that Jim was a very high level instructor and assessor. He got sideways with Vinnie Mauro over something and he pulled Jim's national instructor and national assessor badges. So Jim couldn't use the USSF logo on his site, having been cast into outer darkness. And NISOA wasn't much better. Through some perhaps abnormal situations, I became a NISOA Assessor after only being a member for a year or two. Then I understood from a memo that I had to attend a particular clinic in order to recertify. It turned out that it was only NISOA National Assessors, and those Regional Assessors who were looking to upgrade, who had to attend. So I'm in this clinic with all of these heavy weight (literally in some cases) assessors, guys whose names and faces were regularly in the NISOA national newsletter. They played the critical incidents tape, which may have been the first time they made one. They then asked the assembled people "No foul, foul, foul with caution, foul with ejection." What shocked me was that the range was three! I would expect two, but three? That meant that for almost every incident, some people were saying no foul, some were saying foul and some were saying foul with caution. These were supposed to be the guys who could tell a referee what the right call was and why it was right. At least a quarter to a third of them disagreed with the majority's decision.
I actually don't recall when I first had the USSF badge. I started with a SDCRA (San Diego County) as a 14 or 15 year old. I'm pretty sure I had a LOTG book at that point. At some point my initial assignor (also was my instructor) just told me to show up to some meeting to take another test. I didn't realize it was for the USSF badge but I passed it without any problem. If he hadn't just told me to show up I likely never would have known better (at least for awhile). I could see how a smaller community could have someone who kept the money for themselves. The guy I learned from certainly could have, but there's no way that would ever have crossed his mind. His main job was to expand CYSA over AYSO in the area.
I had somehow managed to watch a soccer match from Brazil. The ref used a can of spray paint to locate the ball for free kicks and measure off 10 yards. I wrote Jim Allen "what is this?" He wrote back what it was. Then added "FIFA doesn't like it being done, but Brazil being Brazil they do what they want."
The worst instructor story I've seen was a guy who had serious financial problems, so he just kept the money from the entry level students. The state office person didn't even think about why they were sending badges and books to an instructor who never returned student registrations. One day, said instructor made a sign. "Do not enter. There is a bomb inside." He then drove to a bank, put the sign outside the branch and went inside to rob it. I don't know whether he had a gun with him or not, but in that part of the state it wouldn't be unusual for someone to come in with a gun. Of course, everybody driving by the bank called 911. As he left the bank, a deputy sheriff was waiting for him outside. After his conviction, I handled the USSF process to pull his badges (referee and instructor). The fun fact to know and tell was that the arresting officer was a fellow referee.