I agree. Being one whistle away from ejection is what makes the game better; I think improved behavior on the part of a coach post-T has little to do with sitting down in most cases. I say "most" cases because I do know there are some coaches who sit themselves down when they feel their temper starting to boil up.

In general I just don't like it. I want to treat coaches like adults, even when they don't always act like adults, because they ARE adults. Sitting them down is like putting a kid in "time-out." Furthermore, that's one more thing you now have to enforce just after you've assessed the T, i.e. you want to move on but you or your partner now have to confront an already aggravated coach and tell him to sit. That's not helpful to mending the coach-official relationship as the game moves on.

I understand I'm in the minority here. I respect that. Can't help but notice many who share my view, however, have college experience. Seems like once you taste what it's like to NOT impose the seat belt, you realize it's better to just let the coach keep standing. Just an observation.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Time to Eliminate the Seat Belt Rule?
 

There is absolutely no evidence that it is better. You agreed with the previous poster that there was no discernible difference. Don't make this about college vs HS officials.

I would agree that not having to worry about watching to see if a coach is sitting after a T would be nice.

The HS rule isn't treating them like kids. It provides a consequence for an action and adults accept the consequences of their actions. If they don't want to sit, they don't earn the T. That is treating them like adults.

I agree with this sentiment too. In my experience the only time this is an issue really is in old HS gyms where there is no room on the sidelines for the coaches. Otherwise a majority of times a coach is on the court HS or college is either after calling a TO or during a dead ball to argue question a call. In those cases unless a coach has come to far or said a magic word my inclination is to first walk him back to his bench. If he doesn't comply it's a T. Second time it happens it's a T. Runs to far on the court a T. It's really handled differently per situation.

I don't advocate automatically Ting a coach simply because he approaches an official to complain/question about a call. But one cannot be afraid to T either way.

And at the camps this is what is taught. The goal is to not T right away but to first try and work with the coach if possible. But like I said if a coach comes running to half court while you are reporting to complain that's T territory.

No matter how good a coach is at controlling his personnel, sometimes there's no stopping the AC spazz out of telling you to go bite dust you suck at officiating.

Again, there are consequences to selecting such an AC. If you don't want to sit, don't hire ACs who cannot control themselves in an adult manner.

In the real world, the vast majority of people just spazz out sometimes. The consequence is 2 FTs and the ball to the other team. I see no benefit to the game for telling the coach he has to sit. I do it, and I don't mind doing it, but I think it's rather pointless.

Agree. Glad NY State (or at least in my area) there is no seatbelt rule. The coach has already been punished. Sitting down doesn't change anything, especially future behavior.

I don't know if it is the technical itself or the sitting down, but around here, things generally get much calmer and quieter after a [edited: first] T. The more tools I have for game management, the better.

I don't umpire school baseball, but didn't NFHS implement some kind of similar rule, restricting a warned coach to the dugout?

I thought your only option in baseball was to eject.

I think, in school ball, there is a 3-step process (warn, restrict, eject), but you can skip steps 1 and 2 for particularly egregious actions. But, again, I don't umpire NFHS, so I may have the procedures wrong.

Nope. Restriction to the dugout and a written warning for minor offenses. Pretty much required now for NFHS games unless the offense is considered major.

NFHS baseball allows official warnings and/or restriction to the dugout in some situations (I won't list them all here), but as far as I'm aware that's not the case in other baseball rulesets.

NCAA also wants an "official warning" for many items before ejecting.

The question for me is not whether behavior after the T is different with or without the seatbelt. At this point, the penalty for the next T is the same either way.

The question is whether the seatbelt provides sufficient incentive for proper behavior prior the first T. In other words, is there a noticeable benefit to the way coaches behave before getting their first T in a game. The only measurable way to determine would be to count first Ts, not second Ts.