How to talk to a referee

[rainmaker]

hooper -- you've hit a nerve, obviously.

Here are some suggestions for the future. In one game I did, both coaches came to my partner and me together and said, "We're trying to help our kids learn to play with less contact. If you'd call it a little tighter, we'd appreciate it."

You can also talk to the assignor, as others have suggested.

The trick to getting what you want is to avoid certain tones of voice and certain phrases. If you say, "They're getting hurt" or "C'mon blow the whistle" or "this isn't football", the ref or assignor will just hit the mute switch, and you'll be talking to a brick wall. Also, there needs to be no suggestion that you're losing because of the refs. Furthermore, you have to avoid certain rule myths, such as "over the back" and "reaching in". Neither of these is agains tthe rules, and refs don't want to hear these kinds of ignorance from you.

What you can say, especially to an assignor, is "other refs in this league have been more strict with the contact, and we like that to be consistent." "Yea, we won, but we felt like our kids were learning bad plays." "I've been working iwth my kids on playing clean defense, and when they get lazy or sloppy, I want them called for it." This gives the message that you want more calls in both directions.

I can sympathize with your concern. And I agree that this can be a big issue at the 7th grade level. You have to approach it carefully in order to get consistency from game to game.