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Referee vs Judge

2/9/2006 12:22:17 PM

Jeannette

176 posts

Referee vs Judge

Dear Doctor

Can you clarify the job of the judge versus referee? If a judge sees a technique that meets the criteria for a point, but there was a penalty-worthy action (pushing, holding, falling, going out of the ring, etc) just prior to the technique, should the judge score it?

Jenny

2/9/2006 12:40:33 PM

bckwh

104 posts

Re: Referee vs Judge
Modified By bckwh on 2/9/2006 12:43:28 PM)

Thank you for your insightful question. The Doctor IS IN! The role of a TKD Judge is simply to recognize, identify, and score valid points. It is the role of the Referee to assess penalties. Inasmuch as we are used to rotating from the Corner Judge position to the Center Referee position, we sometimes fail to leave the role of the Referee in the Center when we resume/assume our role as Judge. A penalty is only a penalty once the Referee makes a dtermination and assesses the penalty. Sometimes the Referee is not in a position to recognize that a violation has occurred, even though a Corner Judge may be in a position to see that violation. It is better to score the point if it has merit as a valid point (i.e. accuracy, power, scoring area, proper scoring implement) and let the Referee perform her/his duty in determining if the point occurred as the result of an illegal action, or if the point was valid and then an illegal act occurred. Should the Referee determine that the point resulted because of an illegal action, the point must be waved off and the penalty then assessed. If the Referee determines that the point was scored and, immediately afterwards. a violation occurred (i.e. falling to prevent a counter-attack, stepping out of bounds to deny the opponent a scoring opportunity, etc), then the point remains plus the Referee must assess the appropriate penalty. A long way of saying that a Judge should only score valid points based on power, scoring area, and proper scoring implement, while leaving the assessing of penalties to the Referee. I am aware of the raging debate on this issue in some corners of the world. Some say that a corner Judge should know better than to award a point when it is obvious that the point was caused by an action that may be penalized. Remember, a penalty is not a penalty until it is assessed by the Referee. Any action prior to that assessment must be considered to be legal attacks. Common sense should also come into play here. Should a player clearly be out of the competition area and the opponent continues to attack due to the ineptitude of the Referee, the Corner Judges may feel within the bounds of Common Sense by not scoring those attacks that take place out of bounds. That's my story, and I am sticking to it!

~BHarris

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