Refereeing for Portlandbasketball.com (3 steps- defined below)

Step 1: to be a referee at full pay- for PortlandBasketball.com you must be a 2-year member of an official referee organization (you must have been trained and active in an organization for 2 years- at least, so we know that you are fully trained and certified); most people reading this (step 1) are already members of such an organization- but for brand new referees, here are some contacts for 3 such organizations in the Portland metro.

Portland Basketball Officials Assoc. (P.B.O.A)- Commissioner Howard Mayo (ph) 503-244-4553 and web site: www.pboa.org. This association is primarily for school officiating, kids through varsity high school.  Meetings are typically held every Wednesday at Cleveland High School at 6:30pm. Call Howard before attending the meeting. This usually occurs each year around October, so reading this today, you will have to wait until October 2012 to join the PBOA.

Tualatin Hills Basketball Officials Assoc. (T.H.B.O.A)- Commissioner Norm (ph) 503-847-8602 and email stormn44 @gmail.com. This group primarily deals with recreational basketball that takes place at the Tualatin Hills Rec Center. They are smaller than PBOA (about 75 members) and also do recreation leagues in Beaverton, Tigard, Lake Oswego, etc. They have many members who work both associations (PBOA and THBOA). This is a good place to get started with the basics and in turn- to get game experience by refereeing any games they give you. They usually start training in early November so as you are reading this, it is too late,  you will need to be ready to join then- before October of 2012. When you join, expect to attend 4 referee meetings (Tuesdays, Wednesdays in November) and you will need to attend the Middle School Jamboree 1st weekend in December (little bit of pay but lots of experience). As a first year member, expect to only referee Saturdays for them and as well- be sure to referee Saturdays (must be available on Saturdays).

 

Evergreen Basketball Officials Assoc. (E.B.O.A)- Commissioner: Neil (ph) 360-921-7145 or email Neil Anderson at neilja@comcast.net or call (ph) 360-608-4038. This group deals with school basketball but they really have a strong emphasis on training referees to make the correct call. PortlandBasketball.com may move to pushing all new referees to EBOA based on the quality, strong officials we have seen come out of that organization. They meet for classes (last year) on September 25th, October 2nd, 9th, 16th from 3pm till 5pm at Liberty Middle School in Camas so perhaps in the Fall of 2012, you can expect the same. And last year as well they had a EBOA camp on June 4th and 5th at Prairie High School, contact Bob V at bobv25@comcast.net for information but if I were trying to become an official, I would attend that camp prior to the September 25th official (first year training). Oh and during the season of officiating the EBOA has 7 meetings (last year November 20th, December 11, January 8, 29, February 12 and March 11th) and they expect you to attend 5 of those meetings. PortlandBasketball.com wants to reiterate that we have seen some very strong training out of this organization.

 

IF YOU ARE A NOT A TWO-YEAR CERTIFIED & EXPERIENCED OFFICIAL, the following is a training (and reduced pay) option for you whereby we train you (a ton of work on our part to train someone from scratch); restated: PortlandBasketball.com will do training for 1st year officials with pay set at $14 per game for the first 300 games (being certified one year will knock off 150 games from the '300  game requirement'). To inquire about this option, contact Mikal Duilio at (ph) 503-380-4539 but before you let Mikal Duilio know that you are interested, you have to go through steps 2 and 3 below- so that we know that you are serious about this- and so we know that you have a basic understanding of how this adult sport works from an officiating standpoint. Of extreme importance is watching every single video from the referee tab. You will also have to purchase your own Fox40 whistle, all black shorts, black socks, black shoes and a referee jersey. If you take all of these steps, we can work with you to try to train you. Our standards are extremely high (not to train, but for you to make it as a year around regular adult league referee- read about that on the referee web page- with the tab called 'how we schedule'); you not only have to know the rules and you have to be able to call the game- to become a regular- but you must be strong verbally as well (meaning, you are able to affect/change a game and keep things safe- through your words). So- if you are willing to do these things, then worse case if you do not make it as a referee for us (the adult league) you will be trained well enough to have a great start with another organization (many referees cannot do adult basketball- but they do great at other basketball- even up to collegiate level and there are probably 20 other organizations you can referee with/for); best case, you are good at all levels of basketball including our unique version of basketball- adult basketball. Again, after you complete all 3 steps defined on this page, call Mikal Duilio (ph) 503-380-4539.

 

Step 2: all interested persons (already certified and/or those people not certified) must read every page (tab) of the referee section of our web site. When finished with reading all 5 tabs worth of information and really important- when finished watching the referee training videos- email us a confirmation

 

Step 3: so after you have finished all of the reading and videos, all interested referees (experienced or non-experienced- both) must fill out the following 2 forms:

- W-9 Form 

- Referee Contract including an acknowledgement that you as a referee- are an independent contractor

- An email acknowledging that you got a copy of the adult league game rules document

- Send these forms to us by email: jesse@portlandbasketball.com or by fax: 503-213-5926

Online: Click Here

 

Legal defensive position (1 min) Legal defensive position is that you are square (in front of) opponent prior to their final step of the move/shot. After the 'moment' of being in front and in 'legal guarding position'- you can be moving backward and/or jumping up and contact should be legal, as seen in this video; in fact, if you are in front and displaced, it can be a charge call.	Incidental contact (1 min) This play could have been a no-call as the contact seems very incidental ('incidental' meaning- the contact did not create an unfair advantage for the person being contacted). This video seems to show a defender flopping, not a defender displaced by contact and therefore this could just as easily be a 'no-call' from the referee as the contact was incidental.
No Call? (1 min) This could be a no-call as the contact is not creating a disadvantage and trained referees know that a foul requires three things: 1) illegal position with 2) contact and 3) a disadvantage created and as the ball goes in pretty easily in this video, it kind of makes the argument that there was not really a disadvantage created.	Block/Charge? (1 min) This looks like a good call (a defensive foul). Plus if you think about it- a defender really should be 'defending'- not setting up for flops. A defender is a player trying to legally impede an offensive player from scoring- but the guy in the video is not trying to prevent scoring as much as he is trying to 'work the referees'.
Various examples of Foul calls (10 explanations in 5 minutes) PortlandBasketball.Com encourages players and referees to watch this video. There are 10 explanations of fouls vs 'no calls' vs charges in this training video.	Law of Verticality (5 minutes) If defender gets 'in front of' offensive player prior to that offensive player's final step of his move/shot, than that defender is entitled to (law of verticality) to the space behind him and 'to the ceiling'; in other words the defender can jump straight up (but- proof of jumping straight up- is that defender landed close to the same spot on floor when coming down). Important- for safety- to understand this concept of jumping straight up as opposed to jumping outward.

How does Portlandbasketball.com schedule its referees especially when we get to the lighter seasons (Summer 1, Summer 2 and Fall 1)- this is a new policy-

PortlandBasketball.com has 5 criteria of what makes referees great - but the new (October 2011) standard that we will rank off of primarily- is which referees are pro-active in nature.

To fully understand what a proactive referee is, go to the "Referee Training Videos' tab and watch video #1. A proactive referee is a referee who sees things coming in advance, sees mood swings, anger issues, potential player issues, mismatches that could be dangerous, aggressive play that could lead to a dangerous play and this type of referee deals with those things- prior to actual trouble on the court. This type of referee prevents bad things from happening on the court not by calling it when it occurs but rather- by predicting what might occur and handle it in advance. A pro-active referee is rare but these are the types that will be scheduled in those 3 warmer-month seasons, no one else will referee during those seasons (non-proactive referees are still great referees but only proactive referees will referee in Summer1, Summer2 and Fall1 seasons for PortlandBasketball.com).

The proactive referee is extremely verbal and will stop games if necessary to issue warnings, concerns, etc. A proactive referee is not just going to call stuff as it occurs or after it occurs- but really the proactive referee affects games and prevents some calls/plays/issues due to saying things like "hands off", "get out of the lane", "go straight up" or when a defender is there but there is contact- telling everyone what he/she had perhaps saying "good defense" (versus saying nothing)- and by saying "good defense" that referee is proactively defending and explaining his/her call to players and preventing the conflict of a player thinking the referee missed the call, when in reality the referee made a rules-based judgment that the defender was in good position, in time and therefore all the contact was legal contact, all by saying "good defense". There is currently about 30 referees with PortlandBasketball.Com that do not handle the verbal part of the game in this manner- but these 30 I am thinking of- get the calls right- all the time- phenomenal referees and in fact, collegiate/professional level really in terms of calls, but with an adult rec league, we want the verbal as well.

A proactive referee is extremely important to games being safe- for adult basketball; you see, proactive refereeing is not really necessary other levels of basketball (college, professional, even high school), but with adult basketball- the referee has to be in control of the entire event so this style is very important to PortlandBasketball.com. PortlandBasketball.com has a list of pro-active referees (currently 15 referees) and another list called- 'Not Proactive but excellent officials (30 referees)' and with this second list of 30 referees- they might even be stronger 'call for call' but they referee after the fact, they are not necessarily 'preventers' or 'game shapers'.

How we schedule referees: well, the director of the basketball league (Jesse) gets a list once per week (Sunday night) from from owner Mikal Duilio)and Jesse schedules off of those lists for the next week (proactive referees first and 'great referees' second... but by Summer1 season 2012, only proactive referees for the most part- will get games in Summer1, Summer2 and Fall1 seasons.

The third tier referees (beyond that top 45 officials) are scheduled third and to be honest, compared to the average referee worldwide, our third tier referees are still- excellent officials- and we like these officials- a lot- and they are good for our league- but to move up, these referees will have to become proactive in their style as our standard is officially changed as of October 2011. Many third tier officials are excellent, we draw a lot of good officials to our organization.

Referees who feel that they are not getting a good amount of games can call owner Mikal Duilio who trains- evaluates and works with officials (officials- this is all optional) and ranks them accordingly. Mikal Duilio works on Sundays 9 hours and Wednesdays 5 hours in this respect.

Upcoming Youth Contracts

Portland Basketball provides referees for various youth organizations throughout the Portland Metro area.

December-February:

YMCA Middle School Basketball

Westside YMCA Basketball

Beaverton Hoop Youth Leagues

Videos for Porltandbasketball.com officials to watch

 

Video 1: Proactive refereeing in an adult basketball league	Video 2: Definition of a foul involves these 3 items
Video 3: Rebound fouls- Offensive fouls- Flagrant fouls	Video 4: Technical fouls in an adult basketball league
Video 5: Identify a Tough Game	Video 6: Rule of Verticality