Last night I turned on the best looking babe on television, Judge Judy. Her first case was a basketball referee suing a coach for $5000 for punching him in the face following a game. According to the show, here's what happened.
It was a Boys and Girls Club 14 and under single elimination tournament game played under NF rules. The game was very close and in the fourth quarter, it started to get a little rough. There was a hard foul and both players went to the floor. There was some scuffling and pushing while they were down and one ref was indicating the call to the table while the other was going towards the players. The coach of one of the teams ran out onto the floor and grabbed the player from the other team. The ref who was near the players called a T on the coach for coming onto the floor. The other team made the free throws and scored on the subsequent possession. The team of the coach who got the T lost by two points.
After the game, both refs went to shake hands with both coaches. As the ref who made the call approached this coach with his hand extended to shake, the coach pushed him in the chest with both hands, knocking him backwards. The ref then dropped his jacket and bag, since he was off balance. The coach then punched him in the side of the face. Since the ref was wearing contacts, there was some eye damage.
The coach claimed on the show that he made the punch in self defense. He said that after the ref dropped his jacket and bag, he started to approach the coach. The coach thought the ref was going to hit him so he struck first.
Of course Judge Judy, in her infinite wisdom, didn't buy one word of it and, after giving the coach a good tongue lashing for doing this in front of kids, ruled in the ref's favor and awarded him the full $5000.
Here's the kicker: the coach is also a ref!!! In fact, he has worked with the other ref before. I wish I knew this guy - he wouldn't hear the end of it from me.
|