REFS NEED LOVE TOO
An honest perspective from the 3rd team on the pitch... the referees. Through humor, analysis and education, we are slowly changing how people view referees and officials in all sports. We care and have a love for the game as much as any player or coach. Sometimes even more. Youth soccer (proper football) is a multi-billion $ industry in the US. Tremendous money is spent on players, competitions, travel etc., but almost nothing spent on developing the next generation of referees. I hope that this Podcast inspires, educates and humanizes the next generation of referees for their own development and appreciation from the players, coaches and spectators they need to work alongside.
REFS NEED LOVE TOO
The Base Matters Most: Rethinking Referee Education for the Masses with Matt O'brien
Hello and welcome to the Refs. Need Love To podcast. Tomorrow is Father's Day, so I'm going to do a little bit of a special intro for you fathers out there. We've got a great podcast today. If you care about developing the next generation of referees and educating the ones that we have and retaining them, you're really going to appreciate today's conversation with Matt O'Brien. So definitely listening for that. Okay, Little bit of a start.
Speaker 1:I this week, literally two days ago I received the nicest gift I've ever received as part of this channel. I've been doing this channel for almost four years. People sometimes send me stickers from their Federation, coins, stuff like that. Like, I get nice messages, but I've never received something that has made me straight up cry. Okay, so I get a letter. I opened this box and the letter is thank you for all you do for the referee community.
Speaker 1:I went down this weird route of making 3d printed figurines for my sister and I. He's a referee and he was experimenting with some AI tools at work and listening to my podcast while doing it, and he writes that he was getting ready and he was pretty nervous about working a semi-professional game and my thought, okay, listening to my podcast, he heard me say don't be nervous, but rather it's excitement, and it got him to think about preparing for the game in a different way. Preparing for the game in a different way. And so he was so inspired and changing his mindset that he writes this led me to think about doing a figurine for you and your son, since it's around father's day. I hope you enjoy it and I can tell you if you see this on YouTube at some point. Okay, it is this 3d printed like three inch high figurines of my son and I in our referee kit with the Umpiro shoes on. I'm like perfect, Like it is the most cherished thing I ever had, and just a little bit about being a dad.
Speaker 1:Okay, I want to get emotional here, but my son this week has been away on this type like outward bound leadership experience off grid in Wyoming. No cell phones, no contact for eight days, and I received this figurine like the day before. We're going to hear from him and immediately I just start crying because not only was so nice, but it just reminds me how much I love and miss my son. Gosh forbid, anything happens to him. And literally yesterday we finally got to hear from my son after eight days. Eight days and he doesn't sound like himself. We were a little concerned. We texted with him and it was very short. How was the trip? Life changing? I don't feel good and we're like what's going on. And so turns out he had actually gotten food poisoning the last meal that they prepared together before they were descending from 11,000 feet, which is pretty darn high and he was violently ill and had to be rushed to the hospital last night in Wyoming it's 1 am, 2 am. We hear from the leadership of the organization. They call us up telling about a situation. It was definitely scary.
Speaker 1:I just want to just say that again how much I love my son, how much this gift means to me, but just in general, how much I appreciate this community that has given back so much to me. I've had some challenging times over the last three or four years, but this community, like every single day, like every single day, just inspires me. I get so many wonderful messages out there that just again just warm my heart Again. We all go through difficult stuff. I'm never going to say I lead a difficult life Right now.
Speaker 1:My dad had bypass surgery earlier this week and you guys know I've talked about my dad many times I adore. My dad had bypass surgery earlier this week and you guys know I've talked about my dad many times. I adore my dad. My dad is my idol, he's my everything, Just over and over again. I could talk about my dad forever, but the bypass surgery wasn't successful. They were not able to give him any relief in his femoral artery, which is the artery that takes blood down to your legs, and they couldn't do any bypass on any of the other arteries as well. They're too calcified. So his situation is only going to get worse in that scenario, and he's got other medical conditions as well, and so it's just been a tough time, obviously for him, for us who love him dearly. So again, just so much gratitude and appreciation for all of you people who are part of this community and send me nice messages of inspiration and have helped me through this last couple of years where I've had a difficult transition in my personal, my professional life, my full-time job. It's just so wonderful out there, Thank you. So just a couple more messages in the mailbag. Just share some of the love and positivity.
Speaker 1:Right now this guy writes hi, David, my name is Jack Sargent and I'm a graduate student starting at Coastal Carolina University. In the fall, I wanted to send you a message because I found your TikTok about a month ago. I'm a soccer broadcaster. I work right now for the Chicago Dutch Lions it's a USL2 and USLW club as well as during my undergrad. I know you said sometimes commentators can drive you crazy, but I want to let you know that your page has helped me get better with broadcasting because you've been familiarizing me with the language of the laws which I like to communicate to my audience. This past sunday there was a yellow for stopping a promising attack and I went over the conditions of stopping a promising attack. That I knew from having watched you. I reffed years ago but my certificate has expired so I've gotten my full refresher on the language of the rules from you. I love it. We're helping commentators out there.
Speaker 1:All right, one more here. This is from Duffy in Southern Maryland. He writes thank you, David, for all your content. I like your format very much. I'm a longtime coach and currently a director of coaching for a small 500-player club in rural Southern Maryland. My youngest just turned 13 and wants to certify as a referee, so both he and I will certify because if I need to hang out. I might as well help and get paid too, Ha. But your content has reignited my desire to get back into the shirt that I gave up to coach. The game has evolved much since I last officiated a high school match. I look forward to being on the third team again.
Speaker 1:Again, thank you for the content informative and inspiring. And again, yeah, like this is so wonderful. So if you want to send me a message again it doesn't need to be positive, it could be challenges you're going through Reach out to me at refsneedlovetoo at gmailcom. I love hearing from you. You are my inspiration. You drive me forward to keep on creating content. It is just so fabulous. Again from me, from the bottom of my heart. All my family, we so appreciate you and all that you're doing for the Refs Need Love To community.
Speaker 1:Just a one little shout out before we get into the podcast today. Just two things. One thing, Okay. So in my professional life I transitioned at a really difficult place I was about a year ago to this really cool small company. There's eight of us. It's run by two sisters in Nashville and we do live activations at events. I was just at Chicago for an event. We were just in Boston. We're in Orlando this week and we do these really cool hands-on, experiential marketing activations at trade shows and celebrations and at family picnics like company picnics and stuff like that for 50 people, for 5,000 people, you name it. We go all over the place and do some really cool stuff. Definitely, check us out at hiphuescom, H-I-P-H-U-E-Scom. If you've got anything going on at your company or you know the events person at your company or organization, give us a shout. Please Give me a shout, Let me know. We would love to participate. Literally, when you're at a small company, the next order is the next heartbeat and we appreciate all your support.
Speaker 1:Talking about small companies, talk about Umpiro. Okay, U-M-P-I-R-O. Umpiro shoes. Again, Leland Grant, he made the shoes for you guys, for referees. Check them out, you will love them. Every single person that I've recommended go check them out. You will love them. Every single person that I've recommended go check them out. They've tried them on. They're like oh my gosh, these things are amazing. They're light, they're flexible, they got great grip, they look good. Please check them out, man, you will not be sad. Use my code. Refs need love too. All one word at officialsportscom, man. It is a deal at 106 bucks to have, honestly, shoes that are going to last you like, probably a good year and be fantastic out there and you'll look good. It is so worth it. So please check them out. Definitely. Also the ref six app. It was so funny.
Speaker 1:I was working a game with a really good friend of mine thursday night. He's a wonderful referee but he doesn't have the ref six app and he kept saying people would ask him how much time is left and it was like the second half and it's 45 minutes after he's. Let's see, we're 12 minutes into the second half. It's. It was like we're in the 57 minute ratio. Come on, bro, do you not have ref six? Can you not tell him what? How much time is left in the half or where we're at? It's just crazy, man. If you're not using ref six, I don't know what you're doing. Seriously, good luck to you. But again, use my code. Get 20% off when you use the code.
Speaker 1:Refs need love too. All right, guys. Thank you so much for listening in today At the time of this recording. Tomorrow is Father's Day. I wish you well. Happy Father's Day to you If you are a dad. If you're a mom, hey, happy Father's Day and a belated happy Mother's Day to you and, again, just use that time to remember to be thankful for your family and all the people around you and tell the people that you love them.
Speaker 1:Hello and welcome to the Refs Need Love To podcast, a show that gives you a real, raw and behind the scenes view of one of the hardest jobs on the pitch the referee. I'm your host, David Gerson, a grassroots referee and certified mentor with over 11 years of experience and 1,300 matches under my belt. You can find me at refsneedlovetocom, on Instagram, TikTok and now on YouTube. Today's guest is Matt O'Brien. He is the state director for the Florida Futures Referee Program and he hosts their monthly webinar series for the Florida Soccer Referees Association. Matt serves in that state director role for Florida Futures, a developmental initiative specifically in Florida for their future referees. He oversees the training and mentorship aiming to evaluate officiating standards across the state. He's instrumental in developing that next generation of soccer officials in Florida. And also very special note he has just completed his PhD in math education.
Speaker 1:So officially I would like to welcome Dr Matt O'Brien to the Refs Need Love2 podcast. Thank you so much, David. No, it's great. I know you and I have been chatting. For close to over a year I had interviewed a gentleman who was in the Florida Panhandle, who was one small cog in the Florida futures machine a long time ago. I've actually dialed in to Florida and there's a few other states SoCal in particular, the Southern California Association, I think, Northern California, and then there's some other associations who really do commit to doing monthly education referee seminars for Florida and you're the lead of that for Florida. Is that correct?
Speaker 2:Yes, so what are some of the topics? This is what we do. What are the issues that are happening at the 98% of soccer fields? Issues that are happening at the 98% of soccer fields that our grassroots referees are at? We analyze the red card reports, the videos that come in, and it's okay. How can we prophylactically build our referees' capacity to avoid these types of issues?
Speaker 1:Did you say prophylactically?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay, I've heard of the word prophylactic. I don't think it means what I think it means. Now I only have a bachelor's degree. Matt, you need to speak to me in simple terms. What do you mean prophylactically about referee education?
Speaker 2:We know that there's issues in the game of soccer. We know that there are issues with parents, there's issues with coaches, there's have issues where there's issues with coaches, there's have issues where there's mobbing. So it's we try to educate our referees how to avoid those situations and how to manage those situations so they don't become a problem. It's huge. Yeah, please continue. So every month we have a different national referee present and we use Nearpod, which is a really cool structural technology. In real time, we're able to get feedback from every single participant.
Speaker 2:One of the biggest problems with a lot of these webinars is that you watch videos and it's just real grainy. Webinars is that you watch videos and it's just real grainy. With Nearpod, you control the video on your device, so we don't have that grainy issue. We ask the referees to, so it's 10 minutes of talking about considerations and defending what your answer is, and then we actually go into videos where they have to provide justify their decision with the considerations, and then they have to provide justify their decision with the considerations and then they have to give their decision. So it's all about building thinking referees.
Speaker 1:I have to tell you I'm so glad you brought up Nearpod about these webinars. I attended one of the Florida webinars not long ago and I think I even messaged you afterward. I was so impressed with how engaging and interactive the format was, because I think we've all been through the traditional zoom webinars where there's someone who's showing a play and there's one person talking and maybe they ask a question in chat. But the format that you guys were doing was fun, engaging, interactive. It felt modern, like in its approach, like a modern learning platform, as opposed to just a traditional one-way street lecture.
Speaker 2:So there's different components we look at. One of the things we do is set up norms, and one of the norms is we treat this like you're in a classroom. A lot of our referees look at these webinars as a podcast. They're driving or working out while they watch it, but that's not how you learn. I try to make sure every five minutes we have some type of engagement and when they're giving us their responses, it's we're not just looking at if they get the correct answer. We're able to look to see what is their justification, what considerations were they using? So we're able to look at real time. It's called formative assessment in education. We're able to see where the issues are in their thought process and address that in the webinar. Under the traditional webinar, you really don't have that feedback. You feel like you're talking to a screen and there's 300 people there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I think it's fantastic. It's probably very helpful that Florida has someone with a doctorate in education who's helping to organize these things. Not everyone has that luxury. Matt, beyond the webinars you're doing in Florida just again, I've heard, is one of these states that's on the cutting edge for education. If there's one thing Florida does a really good job on, are you guys doing differently, beyond the webinars, to help educate your peeps?
Speaker 2:It all starts at the top. Our state referee committee is phenomenal. When you analyze leadership groups, there's two types of leadership groups. There's multipliers and there's diminishers. State refereeeree Committee said all right, we have all of these great people in our ecosystem of referees. How do we use them to make the organization better, versus it being a top-down where four or five people are controlling everything? I pretty much have the autonomy to really work the features program and I have throughout the state. That helped me out and I think it's what I've learned is that we have a lot more great people in soccer that are really willing to help.
Speaker 2:But it's the SRC's job is to make those connections and build those relationships from the SRC to the club level. We just had our Area C AGM and three years ago Jason and I we really didn't have any connections with all these clubs Jason Kopekins, our SRA this year. I know all the clubs. They see me at State cup, they see me at president's cup, they see me at commissioner's cup and we're talking about referee development. I showed in areas, which is the West Florida coast. I showed them two slides of the 20 clubs that we have in futures. The clubs that didn't have their logo on those slides were like hey, why aren't we in futures? How do we get a futures program? We now have futures programs from Immokalee, which is right next to Alligator Alley, all the way up to Beverly Hills, which is up in Citrus County, to Lakeland and Auburn or, excuse me, to Davenport, to all the way out to Clearwater.
Speaker 1:Covering the state of Florida.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's not just about us. It's a pipeline, and the Futures Program is the first cog in that pipeline.
Speaker 1:I want to talk about that. So we've mentioned Futures Program. I know what it is, and OG hardcore listeners may know what it is, or people in Florida, but can you describe what the Florida Futures Program is to our listeners in Florida?
Speaker 2:but can you describe what the Florida Futures Program is to our listeners? Okay, so the Futures Program is for referees between the ages of 11 to 13, and they can only referee in-house rec games. This is like you go to your local club. They have a huge rec program that is affiliated with the Florida Youth Soccer Association. There's no game cards, there's no player passes, it's just kids playing. So our futures referees could do those games.
Speaker 2:The clubs have to agree to be part of the futures referee program and the only thing they have to do is to provide some type of mentoring system.
Speaker 2:So like we have small clubs like Spartan at Davenport that has 150 rec players and each club has the autonomy to do whatever they want with their mentorship program and the referees take a three hour, they watch three hours of modules and learn the laws, and then we do a field clinic.
Speaker 2:That's about three hours and part of the clinic is. The best part about the clinic is parents, the referee, the futures referee, the mentor and the club insider all meet for the first 20 minutes and explain the club culture. I want every single peer that's a futures peer to know their kid is safe at whatever Futures club we have in our state and what happens is I don't need to say it Other parents say, hey, my son has banned his older brother referees at this club and the signer is phenomenal, so it's. And then our SAR Futures referees do U6 and U8 whistles. So I want to see us get let's get the coaches off the field and let's get our little, let's get our futures referees out there blowing whistles and and they work their way up to U10 games.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. I have to tell you, I've never heard of an organization that connects the dots like that the parents, the club administration, the mentor and the referees all together so that everyone knows each other. It's a scary thing like an 11 year old child is a child. We're talking about a fourth grade, fifth grade kid. They're itty bitty kids, like legit kids. These are prepubescent children and we're putting them in environments. You could totally appreciate this. You six and you eight.
Speaker 1:You still can have some charged environments you six loud, but hopefully not really negative or angry, but it happens. These can be challenging environments and to be an 11-year-old child, to be in a situation where you're surrounded by 100 plus people around the field and the parents and the grandparents and the coaches and all the players and stuff it's going to be really challenging environments. Creating just upfront okay, hey, everyone, let's get to know each other, let's talk about the goals, let's talk about what this is going to be like. Who can you talk to if you have issues? Anything like that? I think you're setting yourself up for success early, as opposed to just throwing those children to the wolves and being like, yeah, good luck.
Speaker 2:And so what we've learned is each club has some type of mentoring system. Most clubs have a club mentor and that club mentor is a solid high school referee. They walk around the fields and give feedback to the referees, but they're also looking for those crazy parents Dealing with that so that U11, u12, u13 kid could just focus in on honing in on the referee skills. So we started this two years ago. Four clubs I got a shout out to them Cape Coral Soccer Association, florida Hawks, west Florida Flames and Swan City, because these are the clubs that develop our referees.
Speaker 2:So we looked at we're in an ecosystem, so we have to have quality referees to have quality players, to have quality coaches. So we look at. In Florida, we look at referee development much like player development. We have to have quality referees at the sixth level to build on for your higher level age groups. Just, our focus can't just be on our 2% that are national or looking to become regional or pre-regional, working their way up, but it really needs to be on the base to grow as many quality referees as you can because we have so many games.
Speaker 1:Ah brother, you are preaching to the choir right now. I have argued this so many times In my own home state. I have a lot of respect for the people who run referee education in my state, but I didn't get any mentoring until I went to regionals Five years of reffing before I had any mentoring. And even now there is referee education for the people who are, like you said, pre-regional. But the 98% everyone else, those kids who are just starting out at 13, 14, 15, or, in your state, 11 or 12, there's no organized training and development for those people in our state and that's where the overwhelming majority of soccer is played is at those levels.
Speaker 1:And if people don't have a good experience, the referee is a big part of the overall experience and enjoyment of youth soccer in America. If they're not having a good experience at those levels feeling that everyone's going to be safe, feeling that there's fairness, feeling that people are taking appropriate actions when someone has committed a foul I'd be worthy of a card or something of nature. The good game management dealing with aggressive parents or coaches, things like that it ruins the experience for everyone and so I love that you're making sure that base, foundational level of refereeing is getting as much love, or maybe even some more love, than we've seen previously in our referee education. I love that.
Speaker 2:What our assigners, what we've learned from our assigners is that they don't have issues finding referees, except on high value weekends President's Day weekend because every team from the Midwest and the Northeast comes to Florida for some type of league. They bring all of their players from the state, but they don't bring any referees. We have tournaments at every single complex, so President's Day weekend, we have a couple weekends where we're having to go look and find referees.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:I know.
Speaker 1:No one checks to see are there enough referees? When they're inviting all these teams down for a tournament, all they're looking at is dollar signs. If we invite like 500 teams to this thing over three days, we will make X dollars. They are not thinking about how many referees will I need to be able to cover those games and not kill the referees in the process. So, matt, I have a question for you.
Speaker 2:So the other thing is that, like we've learned with our futures referees, these kids are fired up about referee. They don't just watch the modules, they like memorize it all. So, like, well, we go. We're asking the okay, just a quarter flag, what's this? They are able to identify all parts of the field. They're asking about advantages. They're talking about all right, what, what, how do we give yellow cards and red cards? What are these different categories? And they're fired up.
Speaker 2:So you're teaching this class, you got the little 11 year old who's looks like he's still in third grade, and then you have the 14 year old boy, who is a man child, looking like he's about ready to go to high school next year. And then you have the girls. There we have 27.2% of our futures referees are female, which is, compared to our overall base is like about 16, 17%, yeah, so what we're seeing is a lot of what happens with our girls at the younger levels is that team of players come and so it's exciting and we're already starting to see graduates I love that you do in florida that I've not seen any place else is you have something called pre regional clinics and also what you call mini regionals?
Speaker 1:can you describe what that is? Okay?
Speaker 2:So in Florida we treat our cup season as most states would treat their youth regionals. So it's kind of. I was listening to Tim Howard and Leda Donovan talk about how the Confederations Cup was a dress rehearsal for the 2010 World Cup. If our players are doing that, we as referees have to do that. So we take our Commissioner's Cup, which is a step below it's all rent, and we make that like the World Cup and we bring in four referee coaches for the eight fields. We go through the same process as we would if this was the state cup final. They get an email talking about the three positive things we did well and three things we need to work on, and it's just each event we create as building that base. We also have the Florida Classic, which is a huge adult amateur event that goes on for five days and it's an opportunity for our referees to get seen by national referee coaches, get one of their assessments in. For me, it's great because I get to go shadow some of our different national referee coaches. I got to shadow John Collins and Mark Katalosik, so it's an opportunity for me to grow as a mentor and like we have our own mentor academy in that.
Speaker 2:So the other thing we have is the READY program, which stands for Referee Education, development and Instruction Program. We offer two classes. One is for regional referees and pre-regional referees. It's going to be in Orlando and Orhamas is going to be the speaker. Everybody shows up to Orlando on Friday. We do the fitness test Saturday. We go to Orlando City game on Saturday, do the fitness test Saturday. We go to Orlando city game on Saturday nights and then Sunday we have more education. It's phenomenal environment. They used to have these all over the country 15 years ago, these RTSs.
Speaker 1:And the question I have for you when you go to the Orlando city game, will you guys be going in your full referee kit?
Speaker 2:That is a great question. Hopefully it's a Florida referee on the game.
Speaker 1:I do it all the time. It's a lot of fun. We're actually my son and I will be going to a Club World Cup game in a few weeks in our full referee kit again, and it is a good time. You guys will do well. I almost got beat up the one time I went to an Orlando City game I'd say maybe a little bit of exaggeration I did get heckled and yelled at aggressively walking to the game by one of the supporters groups and then someone you know delivered a nice swift shoulder to my chest when I was walking through the stadium. Of course I was wearing my Atlanta United jerseys. Hey, I understand it was a little aggressive for an MLS stadium, but I'm sure a group of referees you guys will be quite a posse Should be good.
Speaker 2:We also have a ready event. It's a two-day event where the referees come in. It's like a course to take them from being a referee to that next level and going over more of the art of referee.
Speaker 1:I love it. I think there's just so much more to being a referee than just knowing laws of the game. It's wonderful what you're doing with the kids in the Futures Program, because that's critical for their development, and having a pool of referees to do those U6 and U8 games. But referees who are getting trained in development and have that partner mentor on the sidelines great. But that next level of referee that 14, 15, 16, or 45, 46, 47-year-old referee who's maybe two or three years in and can get that game management side of it. Now they know what a trip is and what a push might be or maybe what a handball is, but now they're getting the game management side from you guys, which I think is cool, very cool as well.
Speaker 1:I do have a question for you, because this is something that's come up on our podcast before. We've had guests from the state of Florida who talk about, in both good and bad, that Florida is a highly international and very diverse part of our country. A lot of Latin American immigrants from Argentina and Colombia and from really all over the world, and part of that is their passion about soccer, about football, and that passion means people want to be involved and be engaged. That's fantastic. But also in Latin America sometimes they make it a very uncomfortable place to be a referee and we see those videos all the time, and now that they're in America some of that stuff carries over. Can you talk about what is it that you're trying to do in Florida to help maintain a safe and healthy environment for referees?
Speaker 2:Great point. Yes, florida has some any need. Use soccer games every single weekend. You can get challenged Referees. In Miami they go through the gauntlet every single weekend. So if we go back to March, when our SRA Jason Kopake, our March webinar was a webinar to all referees about RAP and one of the things we realized is when you say RAP, you're talking about the referee abuse policy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, prevention. Yeah, one of the things that's really important about RAP is we need to make sure our referees write good supplementals. We need to make sure our referees write good supplementals. So we have a Nearpod lesson where they have to go in and write supplementals and get practice doing that, because if your supplementals are well-written, the rep policy is null and void. And then our next webinar we talked about managing hostile and difficult situations. How do you handle players mobbing the referee? We take a look at all the referee reports that come in, all the videos and our observations of being out in the field to talk about situations that have been issues so mobbing, dealing with injuries, so getting the heck out of it. Check to see if the player's okay. Coach, comes on, get out of there.
Speaker 2:Kind of going over situations where referees is the worst entity. But also, because that's important too, we have to look at both sides of it. If we can get our referees to be more proactive and thinking referees, it's going to create less hostile situations or they'll have the tools to know how to deal with them. More importantly, what we have on our website is a JOT form. Our JOT form is to upload all supplementals that have to do with breath and this is like a clearinghouse, that nothing gets lost in the process and the SRC knows where to send those supplementals.
Speaker 2:So sometimes referee maybe gets chased off a field. They're doing a first or second year referee. They don't know what to do. They just go to our website and click on referee views. Click on that and it takes them right there. They put all the information in and it goes straight to our SRA and he's able to look at it. It's a data collection. It looks at trends. They could filter the reports. So it's not something the league could handle like serious player conduct. The src can follow up with the different leagues to see if discipline is being applied to make sure that the rap, the rap expectate, that discipline in rap is appropriate for the offense and so far the leagues are doing really well.
Speaker 1:I think that's one of the biggest questions about the referee abuse policy How's it going to be implemented? Are the reports going to go? It sounds like Florida's got a good system to centralize the report submission and to evaluate them and make sure they get seen, because we have seen in and I hear this from a number of people around the country over the years oh, I submit a report, I have no idea what happened. Who knows if anything was done about it? Maybe the assigner didn't send it in, maybe the tournament administrator didn't send it in, something like that. Now it's going to get seen in florida.
Speaker 2:It's going to the sr, it shall be handled and we will implement it per the guidelines in the referee abuse policy, which is fantastic, I love to hear that If our SRA is getting reports from a specific league, if he's getting a report every single week from that league as a state referee committee, they have the day to go talk to somebody. Or if there's a specific coach that's had two or three send-offs. The problem is with the current ecosystem. You've got US clubs, fysa, all these different organizations. They get sent off at one. Sometimes they're able to go to another organization coach. It allows us to get those types of issues.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there was a video I posted on my channel this week of a referee in Kentucky. He was at one organization and was fired from that club because of his abusive behavior towards parents, referees and players. He's now founded his own club, set up a new team where he's coaching and his kid was on that team and there's no other way to say it attacked a child during a game. A child, pushed or fouled his daughter, came in with a shoulder, knocked her down and he physically pushed over the child on the field. Now, with this new referee abuse policy, it's not up to maybe his buddy, the tournament administrator or something like that.
Speaker 1:No, the policy says it could be a lifetime ban and I'm hoping, since there's video evidence and the video has been seen by millions of people, that he does indeed get a lifetime ban from USU soccer. We don't need that guy there. But it provides the right guidelines as long as it's being submitted, the SRC sees it, they know how to implement it when things like that happen and we're not going to see oh, it's just a month here in this association. That association over there is giving five games. It's standardized and action should come of it. And just about that, specifically about the punishments. Have you seen in Florida on the state referee committee, specifically of these reports that are coming to you that have come after a year? Are you seeing an increase in the amount of reports that are being filed a decrease? What are you guys seeing now that we have this new policy?
Speaker 2:I'm not sure on FDNS, jason, but he's our SRA. But before we had no data collection, we had no clue, unless it went from the league to hearing when. Now it gives us a little bit more of an idea of what's going on and we can look at situations where sometimes referees cause problems.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, it's so funny you say that and I kid you not. Two years ago I had a referee contact me saying that he was assaulted, that he was kicked and threatened at a game, and I was like, oh man, I need to have you on the podcast, you need to tell your story. I listened to this guy tell his story and I was like, oh my gosh, there were so many red flags going up left and right and I'm like, how did you not abandon the match? Why did you stay there? Why did you engage in that confrontation? Why did you add fuel to that fire? Just go get saved, call the cops. It was crazy. Listening to him tell it, I was like, yeah, I can't put you on because doing all the things I would tell a referee never to do, never, ever, do this Anytime I have one of these situations where we've got an aggressive coach or aggressive parent comes onto the field, game's over, that's it, we're done.
Speaker 1:If your safety is threatened, get your crew to safety, call the cops if need be, but get out of there. Don't try and argue, don't try. And hey, you're a tough guy, you're not going to be intimidated. Please, man, it's not worth it. It's not worth it. Go get to safety, call the proper authorities, write your and live to fight another day. There's nothing good about trying to match fire with fire at all on the pitch. So talk to us a little bit about so you've done this amazing Florida Futures program. You've got over 400 kids in the program. Now, is that correct?
Speaker 2:We are right now at 342.
Speaker 1:So you're in year two of this program. You have 342 11-year-olds 12-year-olds who are enrolled in this program, who are getting the mentorship, getting this additional training and development, which is fantastic. Talk to me about what in the next three to five years for Florida in terms of education and development of referees, and development of referees.
Speaker 2:So I think we're getting our systems a lot better. Our website is really organized and provides information. We're looking at how to, because you have to have a level two background check in Florida. We can't just use the learning center, we also have to use OMS. So we're looking at ways to help people get through taking a class, to getting the last module done, to getting their back and making things seamless. My goal in the next three to five years is to have eight quarter futures referees throughout the entire state. Pensacola, up in that panhandle, has a bunch of clubs. The whole West Coast of Florida has futures ready to get into the Orlando Indians, the Miami areas.
Speaker 1:I wish you good luck in that. I you know it's so important. I think it's critical.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we have 5,100 referees right now. The goal is to get to 7,500. And so, like this futures mentor, so like our mentors at the complexes for futures, they're also mentoring the local league games referees, so it's trying to get more mentors deployed. I think that's our goal and kind of building relationships with our partners.
Speaker 1:Matt, let me ask you a question about that number. You said you have 5,100 certified referees in the state of Florida. How many players are there in the state of Florida? Because Florida, to me, I'm like that's a massive state with an outrageous amount of people playing soccer 365 days a year in Florida. How many registered soccer players are there in the state of Florida, do you know?
Speaker 2:I have no idea, but the season never ends here. I came from Illinois, which is a soccer state, came here and I burned myself out because there's a big tournament every single weekend from January to December.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's National League events. We talked about the Adidas International events. M's National League events. We talked about the Adidas International events. Mls is doing events, ECNL is doing events. They've got tournaments happening down at Disney. Clubs have their own tournaments as well. So forget about the national events. You've got all the regional events, local events and your normal game calendar on top of all that. So when you say 5,100 referees, a big tournament may need 200, 300 referees. That doesn't seem like enough reps, exactly.
Speaker 2:And we also have a lot of preseason professional league games, oh my.
Speaker 1:God.
Speaker 2:So if you're a regional referee and you're in the Tampa area, there's a good chance that you're going to get a preseason USL championship or USL one or MLS next.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's going to be crazy. Atlanta is a big soccer town and with the new US soccer headquarters here, that's five miles from my house we're excited for all of the international games and all those international friendlies and everything that's going to start coming here. My buddies, I haven't been invited yet. I've been asking the assigner come on, hook me up. But we've had my friends here locally, have gotten U20, women's national team games, u16, national team games just here in my community, and we're going to get more and more of that stuff.
Speaker 1:Similar to Florida, there's a soccer and not just any soccer, like a lot of high level soccer that needs really well-trained, really fit referees. That is for sure. Just exciting stuff. And I wish you all the best in the development of the Futures Program and the great work that you're doing with Nearpod on those monthly webinars and making them interactive, and the mini regionals and all of the additional training that you're doing for the 98% of us right, the ones who are maybe not going to be a regional referee in this next year or never going to be a regional referee or a national referee. But those 98% is what keeps the soccer community alive in our local communities and across our country. So thank you so much for doing that. I have a couple more questions for you, matt, before I let you go, a couple fun ones here. As a referee, what is the worst call you ever made as a ref and what did you learn from it?
Speaker 2:First ever college game. I was 18 years old. I signed up to do a game at Kishwaukee Community College in Walter Illinois. I missed the elbow to the face. The player plucked the ball and pluck hooked it at the player who hit him. I missed the first point of contact where it should have probably been violent conduct, because the ball wasn't even in play and I had 30 minutes of game left to survive.
Speaker 1:Wait, I'm confused. You said a player caught the ball, so it's not the goalkeeper. This is two field players. A player caught the ball, so it's not the goalkeeper.
Speaker 2:Okay, this is two field players Caught the ball and punted it at the player who hit him in the face, so I got it.
Speaker 1:Someone got elbow. I missed the elbow to the face Right, so you don't see the elbow in the face happen. Someone's angry, they catch the ball and then they launch a punted rocket at the guy who supposedly elbowed them, which is potentially a red card there as well. Yeah, did it all just like fireworks go off after that?
Speaker 2:Yes, and then it was raining. I was so nervous before the game that I locked my keys in my car. It was just a terrible day.
Speaker 1:Yes, the classic when it rains, it pours All right. Next question for you Favorite match you've ever officiated and why I've been a referee since 1996.
Speaker 2:My favorite games are working with my referee friends Jason Kopakin, emmanuel DeRiva and Miguel Vartez. Anytime we get a Sunshine State conference game together, it's always great.
Speaker 1:Okay, just real quick pause. I thought you just said 1996, which means you've been a referee for 29 years. Yes, is that right? Almost 30 years, three decades, which is crazy, congratulations. Secondly, so tomorrow I've got a upsl game here in atlanta and my, the center referee and the assistant referee too are on the game. We are all dad 50 years old, like literally each of us, I think, is like 51 50, and the amount of dad jokes that will be going on comms like pre-game during game. I just know, no matter what happens on that pitch, it's going to be a great game because I'm working with people I love and respect and that's a lot of fun. It's fantastic. We used to go out the last question.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry, but oh, really a lot of fun. It's fantastic. We used to go out together. The last question I'm sorry, but we used to go out, but now two of them are married and they have kids, so the only time we see them is on the soccer field.
Speaker 1:I love that. All right, last question, and then we'll wrap up here. If you can change one thing about how referees are developed and supported today, what would that be?
Speaker 2:I think it's an ecosystem thing. If we look at our big clubs in the United States, they don't just put all their resources in looking at developing at the U18, U17, U16 levels to hopefully get a professional player. They're putting resources in at the rec levels to get a curriculum and getting those players developed. We have to grow children from the base and what you're going to see is you're going to create so many more regional referees because you're going to have more competent referees. We have three times as much competitive soccer now compared to 15 years ago. So we have to have more quality referees across the board and I think we're getting there.
Speaker 1:I think that is absolutely true. Matt, you said it really well. We have three times more competitive soccer than we ever had before. Not necessarily the quality is so widespread, because now, even at lower levels, those kids used to play rec Okay, and there's nothing wrong with rec, I'm all about rec, I love rec but now they're in academies playing low teams.
Speaker 1:The expectations for those kids and those teams and those coaches is much higher and they're expecting a lot more out of the referee who is on their match.
Speaker 1:For their $2,000 or $3,000 a year. They're expecting referees are going to have more training, have better ability to manage a match, have more fitness, more professionalism than what they've had in the past, and I think it's definitely a different world. But there's not the same resources and investment for developing those refs. So I'm so glad that you and your fellow referees in Florida are thinking about it, developing great content, the webinar, additional training, the mini regionals, the futures program. I love seeing what you're doing, matt, and I just want to say thank you for doing that, thank you for showing the way and showing a better way. So, matt, just one last thing for you, if someone is curious about the Florida Futures Program and what you're doing there and mentoring Matt. If someone wanted to reach out to you and to learn about the Florida Futures Program and all the things you're doing that are new and innovative in your distance learning on Nearpod, how would they reach out to you?
Speaker 2:shout to you. You can reach me through our website, floridasoccerrefsorg. If you click on referees, you could find the features program and all the other resources that we have on our website, and I'd be more than willing to talk to any state that's interested in doing a similar program.
Speaker 1:Are you also available to help kids with calculus and any other complex math Statistics.
Speaker 2:I'm really good at the intro to statistics class for undergrads. I love it, and time management that's fantastic, yes, very important.
Speaker 1:That's wonderful, matt. Thank you so much for joining the podcast today Sincerely. I love what you guys are doing and I wish you nothing but success. I'm looking forward to the next podcast where we're going to be talking about managing those difficult situations, or not podcast the next webinar that you guys do about difficult situations. Thanks for having me on Everyone. I hope you guys enjoyed today's pod. I'm looking to share best practices from states all across the country.
Speaker 1:If you know someone who's doing wonderful things in your area whether it's in California or Texas or Idaho or my gosh dude Bangladesh, I don't care where you are in the world You're doing something cool to support your referees. I want to hear about it. I want to make sure that everyone learns about it so we can do a better job of training the next generation of refs. Thank you so much for your support. Thank you so much for all the letters and the mailbag. Again, you want to send me a message please.
Speaker 1:I love hearing your stories refsneedloveto at gmailcom. I tell you at least once a week. I'm crying, like reading something, because I love the heartfelt messages that you guys send me, either for support or just about your own story. So keep them coming Again. Please check, check out. The refs need love to store online. Go to the store, check it out, pick up some merch, some cards, some coins, some flags, whatever. Everything gets poured back into making this program possible. And as always, guys, I wish you nothing but love, respect, and I hope your next match is red card. We'll see you next time you.