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If it works for you, that's all that matters.
I was listening to a D-1 official talk ("Ron" for the purpose of this post) about being professional at a camp I went to a couple summers ago. He talked about how paranoid coaches are because we (officials) are the only part of the game they can't prepare for. It drives them crazy.
He went to the visiting coach with his two partners for the pre-game conference and said, "hi coach" and kept it short and professional. His two partners were all smiles and got into some short banter with the visiting coach (who they had officiated before) and a little wit was exchanged and a couple laughs. "Ron" noticed the home coach watching them intently.
They go to the home coach and none of the three refs know him personally so it's short and professional and no clever wit.
Ron said that the home coach was all over his partners all night long and left him alone and Ron is convinced that it was because the home coach made a judgment about his two partners based on the 15 seconds they spent with the visiting coach. Ron had to T the home coach when he went over the top on one of his partners late in the game.
He had some other examples of how paranoid coaches can be about officials being biased and how we need to be completely professional at all times to not play into that perception.
Ever since then, I have made it my policy to address every coach as "coach" only.
If you think that's too much fine, but I appreciated his story and I have seen enough paranoia in coaches to want to do everything I can to avoid giving the perception of favoritism.
Z
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