Last week I had a very disturbing phone conversation with a referee I’ll call Shinpan.  For me, talking to referees in general is disturbing, but this conversation was particularly annoying because it encapsulated and highlighted much of what is wrong with American Judo.

Shinpan informed me that one of my players, who competes and referees, had done a great job as a referee at an important event in California.  The referee committee had already advanced him to N1, the highest national level ranking possible, and now it was recommending him for the next level, the first of several international levels.  Great news, but there was a catch.  To get to the next level, my player needs to be a nidan, and he’s only a shodan.  Shinpan bluntly told me that I needed to promote him so that he could move up the referee ladder.  From that moment on the conversation started turning ugly.

I don’t like being told that I have to promote somebody.  I’ll admit that I have rather high standards for black belt promotions.  Most of my shodans would be nidan or sandan in other clubs.  In my 39 years as a coach, I have promoted only three players to sandan and above.

I told Shinpan that my player doesn’t merit nidan at this time.  So Shinpan used the “time-in-grade” argument to get me to change my mind.  I responded that my player’s Judo competence, which is what I base my promotions on, isn’t up to par for advancement in spite of his being a shodan for almost four years.  You see, I value quality over quantity.

Since the “time-in-grade” approach hadn’t worked, Shinpan hit me with “service to Judo” argument which advocates that you should be promoted because you have “given back to the sport.”  Sticking to my guns, I once again reaffirmed my commitment to require Judo competence to get promoted, especially at the lower ranks.  If competence is not required early on, it’s not likely to miraculously appear in later years, when nature takes over, and competence and performance deteriorate in spite of our best efforts to prevent that from happening.

We took a few detours to talk about teenage referees not being able to become national referees because, although competent as referees, they lacked “maturity.”  Then there was the maximum age requirement the IJF had implemented just before Shinpan was due for his international grading. Here was a perfectly good referee forced to stop his advancement in the referee world simply because someone had arbitrarily deemed 50 to be too old to referee at international events. To hell with the principle of individuality.

After going over all the restrictions and obstacles thrown into the path of advancement, I asked a rather simple question.  Why all the hoops to jump through?  You either can perform something, or you can’t.  If my player is deemed ready for international refereeing, why does it matter what rank he has or how old he is?  If I’m forced to advance him to nidan just to fulfill the referee requirement, does that make him any better than he actually is as a referee or player?  I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the idea that he’s qualified to referee internationally if he’s a nidan, but not if he’s only a lowly shodan.

In my opinion, the “time-in-grade” and “service to Judo” mentality has had a near deleterious effect on the technical prowess of American Judo simply because it allows quantity to trump quality.  This is why we have so many high dan grades (6-9th dans) with limited Judo ability, even when you factor in age and its limiting factors on physical performance. Sadly, only a few of us seem to understand the nasty effects of this mentality on American Judo.

In regard to this story, my greatest fear is that Shinpan’s “service to Judo” mentality is going to rub off on my player.  I believe my player understands the stakes. He knows what he has to do on the mat to improve his Judo competence so that I can promote him to nidan. But the specter of Shinpan’s pushing his own agenda still looms large.