[john@ereferee]

There's some great advice given on this subject. At eReferee.com, we have an excellent article written by Lee Jones (look in the football section)entitled "Communicating With Coaches." It gives some general guidelines, but the only way you'll come to know how much to take is to work as many games as you can with as many experienced officials as possible so you can learn this for yourself. It's a little different for all of us. I would advise you that the words, "That's terrible," are a long way short of, "You're terrible." However, given the circumstances as you described them, your flag was appropriate. You might have been better served to have thrown it in the first quarter when he first started getting on you than to wait until the game is decided and he has nothing to lose by getting the flag. All you walked off was half the distance on a point-after. He didn't learn a thing. Did you?