October 29, 2015
A VERY SPECIAL PERSON
Livingston Parish News Owner Jeff David passed away earlier this week. My heartfelt condolences are extended to Jeff’s wife, Nancy, and children, McHugh and Ashleigh… and to anyone/everyone who knew Jeff. It is a tremendous loss. What an amazing job Jeff has done with the Livingston Parish News. And, as great a publisher as he was, he was even a better person.
Jeff and Nancy David owned Christian Country, 1210AM, when I co-hosted/produced a sports-talk show at the station in the mid-90’s. Although there were challenges having such a show on a station with such a format, these were some of the best years I have ever had in radio. The biggest reason is that Jeff and Nancy (and station GM Rip Miller) treated me fairly and were great to work with.
Sam Muffoletto, who has worked for Jeff for 2 decades at the Livingston Parish News, will come on our Denham Springs HS Football radio broadcast on Friday night to talk about Jeff.
If there were more people like Jeff David, this world would be a lot better place.
Thank you, Jeff. May you rest in peace.
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SPORTSCENTRAL
Hosts Steve Johnson and Sid Edwards are scheduled to be joined by guests including CHS players Jameel Jones, Ross Melton and Xavier Lewis. See programming information just below.
PART 3
It’s the third stanza of Dennis Dearie’s multi- part look at high school referees. See HEY REF column, right after Scott Osborne’s THE WIZARDRY OF OZ.
BATON ROUGE AREA BROADCASTING SCHEDULE:
Thursday, October 29: 5pm—6pm: SportsCentral… with Sid Edwards and Steve Johnson
Radio Amour 91.9 FM, Central
Friday, October 30: 6pm: Denham Springs HS vs Walker HS
Jon Fine, Andy Duckworth
Fox Sports Radio, 1210AM, Baton Rouge
JonFineProductions.com
SportsRadio 1310 Radio, Lake Charles Programming of Interest (also heard on KEZMOnLine.com):
Friday, October 30: 6:45pm: Sulphur HS at Barbe HS
Bruce Merchant, Clopha Boudreaux
KEZM, 1310AM, Lake Charles
KEZMOnLine.com
Saturday, October 31: 9AM—10AM: All Things Football with Scott Holtzman
Monday, September 2: 8AM—10AM: The Locker Room with John Goodman and Jim Gazzolo
WE THANK YOU FOR DOING YOUR UTMOST TO PATRONIZE SPONSORS OF OUR PROGRAMMING. THIS HELPS US TREMENDOUSLY IN SUSTAINING OUR WEEKLY LINE-UP AND WILL ASSIST US IN ADDING MORE PROGRAMS IN THE FUTURE. KINDLY MAKE AN EFFORT TO LET SPONSORS KNOW YOU HEARD THEIR BUSINESS MENTIONED ON OUR BROADCAST(S).
THE WIZARDRY OF OZ
Assistant Basketball Coach and Head Swimming Coach at Central High School
With LSU on a bye week, it is time to open the ‘ole mailbag.
Q: Scott, two weeks ago you implored the Saints to stop trying for so many big plays on offense, get all three running backs involved, and take some chances on special teams. Looks like you got all three against Indy.
A: It definitely looks as if the Saints coaching staff is getting a better handle on this team, and how to play to its strengths. They even got Brandon Coleman a catch. They deserve the credit for actually implementing a plan to get all three running backs involved, get a blocked kick against Atlanta, and the fake field goal against Indy. That being said, if Tom Benson wants to pay me a consulting fee, my address is…
Q: Before the season, you said the media may be wrong about the weakness of the NFC South. Looks as though you may have been right.
A: Sure is nice to be right once in a while. The Panthers amaze me. Without a quality wide receiver they just keep winning. Olsen is possibly the most underrated TE in NFL history. As for Atlanta, with their receivers and quarterback, they just needed to find a running game.
Q: I remember you said Auburn and Alabama were too talented for LSU to win those games. Want to retract that statement?
A: The first team for sure. I trusted what I was reading about Auburn’s defensive front, Duke Williams, and Jeremy Johnson. Wrong! As for the Tide, they are exactly what I thought they would be this year. Very talented, but a quarterback away from being a national championship team. As for their matchup against LSU, their defense is still awesome, and their strength is their front seven which makes them a perfect matchup against LSU. I’ll wait till next week though, for that breakdown.
Q: Time for basketball! How about the Tigers and Pels?
A: I would love to buy in to the national talk about the Pels, Alvin Gentry, and Anthony Davis. But, I am very concerned about the injuries to start the season at the guard positions (I am not overreacting to the loss at Golden State, this was written before Tuesday night). To play the style Gentry wants to play you need quality depth, which just is not there right now. It seems like I have the same feeling at the beginning of every year with the Pelicans. Hopefully, they can hang in there until everyone is healthy, and those players stay healthy.
As for the Tigers, I think most predictions are very conservative. The Tigers should be better this year. I appreciate Martin and Mickey, but they lacked a number of qualities that are required to lead a college basketball team. LSU is actually deeper this year. The Tigers have a great mix of extremely talented freshmen and veteran players.
Q: You seem pretty proud of your predictions, care to take a shot at LSU vs. Alabama?
A: Wait! How could you know the other questions before the article is sent out?! Ha. I am going to wait until next week to give a breakdown of the game. I will make this statement, though. No matter what happens in Tuscaloosa, I think LSU is in a very tough position the following weeks. The Bama game will be extremely physical as always, and LSU has simply been unable or unwilling to develop depth. Furthermore, the Tigers have been overly reliant on the big play offensively and overly suspect to the big play on special teams and defense. I have extreme confidence to say that LSU will be required to play better four weeks in a row to close the season than they have needed to play in any game to date to stay in the SEC Championship hunt.
By Dennis Dearie
Veteran Louisiana HS Referee
This is the third part of a special three part series delving into the LHSAA’a high school football officials.
I’d like to thank all those that have taken the time to read the previous two columns. Next week I plan to answer all of the questions I’ve received so far and those I’ll be assured of getting this week. But before I answer any questions I felt that I’ve got to pass along my reasons and the situations that lead up to my abrupt and sudden walking away from what I love to do. For starters it felt many veteran officials seemed threatened that they’d lose their spot in the pecking order of game assignments.
In my first game action of the year during our pregame meeting I asked if we were going to use the “new” way of covering kickoffs. In a five man crew it calls for three of the five officials to be on the goal line. I offered that we take one official off the goal line and move him up to cover the receiver’s restraining line which is usually the 50 yard line. Too many times problems happen there and having just one man there causes way too many problems. I was told “no, we’ll go with the new mechanics” so along with two other members of the crew I lined up on the goal line.
And of course early in the first half the kicker squibbed a kick (this was not an intended on-side kick). The official covering the play called out “Blue, Blue’s ball” indicating blue had recovered the ball. Just one problem and it was a big problem he was pointing, indicating “white” had recovered. Confusion reigned as by the time I made it from the goal line to the 50 the recovering coach was screaming his player recovered, which was correct.
I asked the official who had position and he said blue which made me ask why he pointed toward white’s goal line. He quickly changed the direction he was pointing in and you can guess what the other coach had to say of the confusion. So while the referee went to both coaches to explain I made the comment to the umpire “that’s why I like having two guys up on the receiver’s restraining line”. His answer was totally out of order as he yelled at me “That was your call. You’ve got to hustle and cover that kick”.
Of course all he was doing was covering for his buddy as I was the new member that just transferred in to his association. I let it slide because we all knew his buddy had screwed up. Later in the game one team calls time out on a third down to consider the play they’ll run. While running third down a flag was thrown for offensive holding. After the play another flag was thrown on the offense for a dead ball foul.
I marked the dead ball spot while the referee and umpire decided how to enforce both penalties. They walk off 35 yards and as I’m trying to explain their mistake I’m told to basically don’t bother them because they know what they’re doing. I tried telling them that since the offense didn’t make their first down the offended team can decline the penalty have the dead ball (15 yards) enforced and it’ll be 4th down. I thin k to myself O. K. guys if you know what you’re doing why is the coach going nuts? The offended coach wants a conference which the referee grants.
After just two minutes the ref comes out onto the field and asks me “Where was the dead ball spot”? Seems the chains were told to move to the new spot. Not only were they wrong but the yardage they walked off was wrong since 10 and 15 are 25 not 35. The ref now acknowledges I was right and the holding foul will be declined and we’ll just walk off the 15 yard dead ball foul. So Mr. Ref calls me over to him and wants me to spot the ball so he can walk off the 15 yarder. He tells me it was my responsibility to know where the spot should be since I was the one that ruled on the previous play. I said just walk back 35 yards since that’s what you penalized. A simple way to correct your mistake that you’ll then penalize only 15 yards since the holding foul was declined to bring up 4th down. But again I’m told I was the one that was the cause of this screw-up.
When I decided to return to officiating football games it was not to call as many playoff games that I could. Nor did I care to work a game in the Super Dome. I assure everyone that was the farthest thing from my mind when I decided to return to the field after being “retired” for more than ten years. One of the earliest things I remember being told was “don’t talk to so and so because you’ll never get to the Dome or call any playoff games”. I didn’t come back to work any playoff games because I’ve called too many to count. I had no desire in getting the nod to work a state final game in the Super Dome because I’ve been there and done that.
My one and only reason for returning was to try and get my local association back on track at being the premier association in the entire state. A position that I’d helped build through years of hard work and dedication to the little things! Test scores are always a place to start but to me a guy that can apply common sense on the field always trumps book sense. But again there has to be a starting point so getting guys up to speed on rules knowledge comes first.
I was shocked to find that the three associations I worked games in the past four years just told their members to “learn on your own” which of course everyone knows is 180 degrees opposite with the way I think and this must be changed. The LHSAA changed the testing procedure this year and it was a tremendous failure. We were given a “study” guide from the LHSOA that did nothing to prepare us for the test. In fact the only thing the Louisiana High School Official’s Association (LHSOA) was successful in was to piss off the principals by threatening to strike if we weren’t given a $5.00 per game increase.
My “Old School” training had a mindset that to get better games and better pay was to become a better official. I’ve written that in stone as it should be the only way an official can move up. But I found that those that shared adult beverages with those in power to assign games were once again poising the relationship between fellow officials and coaches. As a retired union member when contract negotiations came around we had just one bargaining chip that being of course our hands. We were selling labor and only labor. The question we needed to answer was if our labor warranted more money this time around! That’s all officials can offer the coaches, players and principals, our labor.
Officiating sports in today’s hectic world offers few rewards and isn’t something I recommend for the faint at heart. You’ll be abused, used, cheated and disrespected by just about everyone. There are very few rewards to be had. You’re expected to be perfect every second of every game. There is very little respect coming your way and sideline abuse is rampant. It saddens me to no end to see and experience the decline in a craft I once cherished.
There are many things I’m not able to print so I’ll close with that. The decline in officials and officiating has many reasons but the one I find so offensive is the constant back stabbing of officials by other officials. The “crew” concept went by the way of the dinosaurs. So I’ll ask this final question “If you don’t respect yourself and those you’re supposed to respect how can you expect respect from others”?
Till next week…
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