[Back In The Saddle]

Snaqs, it's pretty rare when I totally disagree with of your posts. But I do in this case.

"So, since this guy is grabbing his bag and heading for the door, he gets a free pass?" I'll come back to this one.

"If he'd waited a moment, sat on his bench, and said the same thing as you walked past him, would you T him up? I would have." But he didn't. A different situation may require a different way of addressing it. But this wasn't a different situation.

"Maybe the T here shows the other players that they don't get a free shot just because they've already been DQ'd."

Okay, to the meat of my disagreement. If you have to start this sentence with the word "maybe" it tells me you're searching for a justification to fit your point of view. If the justification for ejecting somebody isn't obvious, should you really be ejecting? I don't think so. I don't really think you do either.

The word "shows" disturbs me too. To me, in this context, this has just one meaning, as in "I'm gonna show 'em!", a phrase that inevitably flows from a sense of having received a personal insult or injury. Where was the insult or injury here? That the player didn't agree with the foul calls? The official is the authority figure, he has the whistle and the T. If giving the guy a T for his fifth foul isn't "show" enough, how much "showing" is enough? And what exactly are you trying to "show"? To whom? And why?

And then there's the use of the phrases "free pass" and "free shot". Are you sure you're not taking this just a tad personally?

"Allowing a free shot isn't allowing the situation to dissipate, it's setting up future escalation."

I just flat out disagree with this. Allowing a coach, player, wife, teenage daughter, etc. to have the last word in an argument that you've "won" is usually very de-escalating. You made your point; they made theirs. It's not exactly rational, this need on their part to score some final point in a losing battle, but it makes them feel better about losing. As long as compliance follows, and the "last word" isn't threatening, obscene, escalating, etc., let them have the last word and move on.

And if, in this case, it leads to future escalation (I assume you mean by that player in a future game), then at that point you've got your clear justification for ejecting him.

"No, neither T would normally justify further action, IMO, but combined, they're easily an ABS situation. Do we hold back on 2nd Ts just because nothing said for the 2nd one really, by itself, earns a report to the state or conference?"

IMO it is a different situation where there's a "state" or "conference" involved, as opposed to a wreck league. But even in the HS game, where the state has a vested interest in backing the official, the notion of a justifiable ejection is important to an official's career. Would "further review" of the ejection you propose, considering the known history between these two, show the ejection to be clearly justifiable? Or will it merely look like somebody trying to "show" somebody?