Sports November 7, 2010

In every game, officiating is always in question. It naturally should be, as contraversial calls are part of the game. However, some calls are plain crazy. I know they always try their best, and officials want the game to go more smoothly than anybody, but interpreting rules sometimes does not happen. If officials were meant to just read off a rule, then we mush as well use robots instead of people. But officials are people, and they should be able to use their intellect and logic to determine if the rule applies to what happened on the field. Of course there will be a lot of opinion involved, and some calls might not be right, but after a while, similar plays will show up. At that point, an accepted logic for how to apply the rule comes in, and the call by the official should be relatively simple. Since most proffessional sports have been around for a while, these calls should be pretty easy to make. However, leagues only seem to put many new rules in the play book. Of course some rules need revision, and some need to be added, but it becomes pretty confusing if the accepted logic for what a call should be changes every few years. I think sports leagues should stop adding new rules and changing old ones unless it is absolutely necessary. They should instead focus on developing knowledge for how the rules are to be interpreted, so there is an accepted logic for how a rule works, simplifying the jobs of official. It will also make calls from game to game more consistent.