One of the things I do for our local kids rec league is help train the newbies, mostly HS kids. That's what I was doing this morning when I was working with a HS freshman in only his 5th and 6th games ever. We were working a pair of 5/6th grade girls games. The first one went rather well and he did a pretty good job. I had only a few comments, mostly on rule interps.
In the second game, however, we get to the 3rd quarter and it's already a 25 point blowout. He calls a shooting foul (absolutely the correct call) against a girl on the team that's behind. The coach jumps up (we do not recognize a coaching box) and yells, "That's a bunch of crap!" My partner looks at me, I give him kind of a "what are you going to do about it" look and he whacks the coach. As he's walking over to report it, the coach says to him, loud enough that I can hear it, "Oh, I bet you feel like a big man now." This time my partner didn't even bother to check with me and he whacks him again and also gives him the "you're outta here" mechanic. Before the coach can say anything else, I run over (which was a real effort at my age) and get between them. I tell the coach that if he doesn't want this to escalate, he should just pick up his stuff and leave quietly. All the coaches in this league know me and they know to heed any advice along these lines coming from me. He just did exactly what I said.
I discussed it with my partner and told him he did exactly the right thing. He said that it felt "really weird, like I was getting a rush or something." I told him that you always remember your first.
It made me feel like a proud parent.
