“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
Mistakes are not optional in football officiating, they’re inevitable. The question isn’t if we’ll make one, but when and, more importantly, how we’ll respond when it happens.
Henry Ford put it bluntly: “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” That’s the danger for us as officials, not that we miss a personal foul, blow an inadvertent whistle, screw up penalty enforcement, or incorrectly rule on a play near the goal line. The real failure is brushing it off and never extracting the lesson.
John Dewey said, “Failure is instructive. The person who really thinks learns quite as much from his failures as from his successes.” When we’re willing to break down an error, reconstruct the play, discuss it with a crewmate or mentor, and determine the right application, we take a failure and turn it into growth.
Helping New(er) Officials Handle Mistakes
James Clear offers a reminder in his 3-2-1 Thursday newsletter: “Stories of failure resonate more than stories of success. Few people reach the top, but everyone has failed—including those who eventually succeed. If you’re teaching people how to succeed in a given field (or talking about your own success), start with how you failed.”
When you’re mentoring or simply talking with a newer official who just made a mistake, share your own failures. Let them know their failure is not unique. Tell them about the inadvertent whistle you blew, the foul you missed, or the penalty enforcement error you made. The point isn’t to relive your embarrassment, it’s to show that mistakes are a universal part of officiating, and that resilience and correction matter far more than perfection.
Responding to Our Own Mistakes
We should never wallow in errors, but neither should we ignore them. If you missed something in a game, don’t bury it. Reconstruct the play afterward. Think through every component of the play and your thought process in making your decision. Then, take the next step, talk it over with a trusted official who can help you land on the appropriate lesson learned.
The best officials have short memories on the field, but long memories in training. They let go of the mistake in the moment so they can move on to the next play, but they revisit it in film study or postgame debrief so they can learn from it.
Mistakes are not a threat to your credibility—they’re an opportunity to build it. Coaches and crewmates will respect the official who owns an error, learns from it, and improves. What they can’t respect is the official who insists he’s never wrong, or the one who keeps repeating the same blunders because he doesn’t put in any work during the week.
Quiz
Read the quiz stem and then choose the best answer. (Choose all that apply.)
During a touchdown run, the line judge throws a flag for unintentional contact in the restricted area with a Team A coach. The 15-yard penalty will be enforced from the __________.
- spot of the foul (with no touchdown)
- try
- subsequent kickoff
- None of the above, the penalty must be declined to score the touchdown
Review Rules 8-2-4, 9-4-8, 9-4-8 PENALTY, and 10-4-5c