These philosophies have existed in the 20 years I've been doing this and I presume long before that. Coaches and players generally seem to understand them and agree with them (doesn't stop them from arguing when they think they wish something away from the play would have been called in their favor). A back side hold or a defensive hold away from the throw will usually get a talk to by the covering official. "The ball comes this way and that's a hold" usually gets a positive response from the offender. They know you are watching and saw what they did and it would have been different if the conditions are different. This works when the philosophies are taught consistently, applied consistently, and reinforced consistently through evaluations. From what I see at the levels higher than me, this is done pretty consistently. If you don't know or understand the philosophies I can definitely see why you would think it's selective or inconsistent.
We have officiating shortages all over the country at the high school level and below. If you have any interest in doing this please let me know and I would love to put you in touch with someone in your area.
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Thanks for taking the time to explain things.
Like a lot of the posts here, I see the "philosophy" but wonder if it's being taken to the point of creating an arbitrary game. An uncatchable ball is a fact which negates an interference. That to me illustrates the idea of not calling a penalty when it provides no advantage. But in the case of #22 in the end zone, the ball itself is clearly on target until #3 intervenes.
#22 is not off in a corner somewhere. He is integrally part of the action. To say the defense got no benefit implies the ref has omniscience about how the rest of the play will unfold. That is very different than an overthrown ball. In the uncatchable pass case the ref does have full knowledge that the ball could NEVER have been caught. And they frequently throw the flag anyway and then wave it off. Here it's a mere coincidence that in this case the ball didn't make it to #22... But it COULD have in the normal flow of the game, perhaps is goes through the hands of #3. If refs don't flag what clearly can't give an advantage, that's sensible. If they don't flag what merely happened not to give an advantage in this particular moment, they are really being arbitrary, indeed, playing God.
What if instead of it being an offensive player, it was a defensive player intercepting the ball? I just have the strong feeling the ref would be more likely to call that interference, even though substantially they are the same. That seems to be making calls based on outcomes instead of rules.
