Parent/Umpire

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Blue37

If an official/parent is sitting in the stands behind the bench, and he leans forward and whispers in the coach's ear to remind him of the rule change, is he a backstabber?

Yes.

If he's going to remind a coach about a rule change, he's also going to tell the coach when he thinks that a call was blown or missed also. Anybody that thinks differently is just incredibly naive imo.

Quite simply, officials are held to a higher standard than parents. You're one or the other. If you're there as a a parent, enjoy the game and don't try to officiate it. Anybody can sit up in the stands and criticize the officials. We call them "fans". If you are an official, you don't sit behind a rat and publicly critique your fellow officials to that rat.

Some people understand that. The ones that libel/label an official that misses or screws up a call by calling them incompetent hacks or mopes obviously don't understand that. And I doubt that they ever will, unfortunately.

I can tell you from experience that once someone gets a reputation for commenting negatively and publicly on his fellow officials at games, he's going to have a hard time finding regular partners. He quite simply will not be trusted by other officials. And deservedly so.

There's constructive criticism and destructive criticism. Officials should know the difference.

Jmo.

[c4in]

I have worked a few of my daughters (catcher) 14U games. The team, and especially my daughter, knows that I am a stickler for rules. I know I should not be working her games, but when the umpire pool is only ankle deep, it happens. I try to forget where the teams are from and who is playing and just “see” the plays and call what I see.