In 2011, I was sharing a presentation with officials called "The F.I.T. Official." The argument: the sports industry has studied every athlete on the floor and never once studied the people who run the game.
That same year, at a Pac-12 summer training, I heard John Adams — the NCAA Coordinator of Men's Basketball Officiating — say something to the room that grounded me. Not because it was new. Because I'd spent that entire year making the same argument.
"You are professional athletes. Take care of your bodies."
The late John AdamsNCAA Coordinator of Men's Basketball Officiating · Pac-12 Summer Training, 2011The 2011 presentation wasn't a wellness talk. It was a direct challenge to how officials think about the relationship between their physical and cognitive condition and their performance. Three arguments were at its core, and none of them have aged out.
Every player in the building has a performance staff. We don't — we never have. We've always figured it out ourselves. This is the first place we do it together.
Three things the industry has never bothered to track:
The survey is where that record starts.
Mentorship takes many forms. Four minutes of yours changes everything.
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