Stott, drop and roll

So, there were several things that I could have written about after watching Red Bull New York edge Los Angeles 5-4 last night at Giants Stadium. I could discuss David Beckham's impact on the Galaxy or Carlos Pavon's revival or Jozy Altidore's brilliance or the dreadful state of the Field Turf or the fact that the defenses of both sides played like crap (the Galaxy's poor D due to injuries and New York's due to Bruce Arena), but it wasn't the flurry of goals or even the historic attendance that caught my eye. It was the absolutely lousy refereeing by Kevin Stott.

Now saying an MLS referee is lousy is like calling a midget tiny, but even with the bar set so low in MLS, Stott's performance was dreadful. If you ask almost any player about the officials, they will almost always say that they just want the match to be called consistently. The referee needs to decide ahead of time, the type of foul that warrants a caution and then stick to it. They need to hold both teams to a consistent standard and allow the players to decide the game.

But the often unspoken assumption is that the referee will also make the calls necessary to protect the players from injury by punishing recklessness, and he will make the calls to prevent a team from gaining an unfair advantage. In short, the referee must impose his authority on the match by maintaining the integrity of the rules.

There were several moments in last night's match when Stott failed at his duty. It began in the fourth minute, when Stott failed to demonstrate his authority by sending off Ty Harden, who, as the last man, pulled Altidore down and prevented a 1-v-1 opportunity. Los Angeles should have been a man down for 86 minutes. But it wasn't only New York who was the victim, a two-footed challenge by Dave van den Bergh on Beckham, had the Englishman screaming at van den Bergh for his recklessnees, but there was no yellow card shown for the dangerous challenge. Later Clint Mathis slid in on Beckham as well, with no chance at the ball; no yellow that time as well. In fact there were several dangerous tackles that went unpunished beyond a foul and sometimes even the foul wasn't called. Is this consistency or incompetence?

In all, Stott pulled the card from his pocket only three times during a match that warranted a flash of color many more times, given the recklessness abandon of both teams. Los Angeles lost yet another defender to injury (Ante Jazic in the 17th minute) and there were many players who finished the match limping (Mathis, Altidore, Beckham, etc.). Both sides were fortunate that more players were not injured.

Perhaps the incredible atmosphere of Giants Stadium, that clearly inpsired the players relentlessness, was infectious enough to distract Mr. Stott from his duties as game gatekeeper. A 12-year veteran, Stott, who was chosen to officiate in last year's World Cup, has a reputation of one of the better American referees, which made his poor performance even more shocking.

In a match with so much drama, so much passion, it becomes even more imperative that the referee holds fast to protect the players from their own adrenaline, their own zealous play. And Mr. Stott did not.