You'll love this one! I walk into a bank yesterday. Mother of a HS girl player calls me over. Her daughter has been playing HS summer league ball. In their last tournament the mother shouted something at an official from the stands. He turned to her and told her to "shut up!" She asked me, "Can a referee really tell me to shut up?" I smiled and replied, "Yes, but it probably isn't the most professional choice of words on his part." As I walked away I remembered the old adage -- Summer Ball, (or AAU or AYBT) "Set the bar low and keep it there!" Wonder what those games were like?

I completely agree that it isn't professional. The ref was wrong. However, isn't it just so "fanatic" that the mother is more concerned about the refs behavior than the fact that she's up in the stands yelling, quite possibly embarassing her daughter. Ignorance must be such bliss.

Z

Come on Z, don't you know that it's open season on officials for any type of verbal abuse, but don't dare hurt mommy's little feelings!

Dog-gone-it, Refs don't have feelings!
You gotta have thicker skin then that!
We were just messing with you!
I gotta cheer for my team!
Get the call right and I wouldn't have to yell at you so much!
Get in the game ref!
Call it both ways ref!

All the while their kid is hiding their face in embarassment.

I believe her husband's comment after the ref said it was, "I guess this is a learning time for referees, too." He's a decent guy. but I'll bet he'd take great offense if I said something like that in regards to his insurance business!

Reminds me of a story. My wife works with this very nice lady (off the field) who completely loses her mind when she goes to her son's football games. The entire first half, she's yelling ignorance at the football officials every time they have a flag or any kind of whistle. She's so bad that the other parents are turning around to look at her. After quite a bit of this, another whistle goes off. She stands up to yell loudly at the officials, "now what!?" The other parents turn around and tell her, "it's halftime."

Z

At least where I live the football officials tell me that they are far enough away from the stands that they can't hear the comments. O to have a set of ear plugs like the one I used in the Summers when working at a steel mill.

Yeah, her behavior was almost as embarrassing as misspelling "embarrassing" on an international discussion board. You realize this goes on your permanent record. :D

Oohh, score one for Padgett!

Funny, but you seemed to have misspelled "behaviour" :D

(oh boy am I gonna get it...)

The spelling depends on where you live. They're both correct:
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=behaviour
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=behavior

I can live with that. I missed a call once too. :D

Z

Hmmm, someone didn't quite get the joke....;)

I'm sorry. I don't officially recognize an alphabet that consists of 52 letters: A, A, B, A, C, A, D, A.........

Ahhh, that's more like it....