"The Basketball Fix"
 

I was at the local Dollar Store (Nordstrom's had just closed) and found a bunch of DVDs in the two-for-a-dollar bin. I couldn't resist buying one called "The Basketball Fix". It's from the mid-50s. John Ireland is a sportwriter and Marshall Thompson is a HS basketball star who is ready to graduate but has not yet picked a college.

Ireland helps him get a scholarship to "State" and he inadvertantly gets involved with a gambler. Of course, he starts shaving points and the gambler pays him off big time. They all get caught in the end when he fixes the "National Championship" game, which just happens to be played in State's old gym.

What was fun was seeing the game footage. The referees were wearing striped long-sleeved button down shirts with striped collars, plus light grey belted, pleated pants. They seemed to be wearing black Chuck Taylor All-Stars on their feet. It was weird to see them signal two points after every basket.

If you get a chance to see this movie, do it. It's definitely worth fifty cents.

Was Jurrassic an extra in the movie???

No, but Jurassic wore <b>almost</b> the exact same outfit when he started out as the officials wore in that movie. My first year, as a just-turned 16-year old, was 1959-60. We wore grey slacks with a black belt, a long-sleeved broadcloth black-and white striped shirt(and you couldn't roll up the sleeves either), and white socks with high-cut white running shoes. Black low-cut Chuck's weren't available until a couple of year's later.

We looked goofy as hell. You don't know how lucky you are with the quality and variety of equipment available now compared to the way-back days.

Btw, my very first assignment was a high school varsity boys game. That's how it was done back then- sink or swim. Talk about being thrown into the fire......

Dinosaur Ref
 

Did you really signal two points after every basket ? And if you did what was the purpose or thinking behind it ?

Great Story JR! Thanks for sharing those memories.

Watching movies like that and Hoosiers does bring back memories, Dude. Good memories.

You know what is amazing? How come I know <b>less</b> about basketball officiating <b>today</b> than I did back then?:)

It's true, it's true....

Yeah, that was a mechanic. I think that it maybe was used because a lot of gyms had crappy rings and short nets. Sometimes when a shot was "all ball", you had a hard time telling if the ball actually went in because nuthin' seemed to move- rim, net, board, nuthin'. I can remember double-clutching from the trail a few times because I wasn't real sure. So.....we signalled every shot. They changed that a few years later to just signalling the table if you thought that there might be a doubt.

No. Sometimes you signaled just one point after a FT. Sorry. Couldn't help it. But the truth is, this wasn't abolished until fairly recently. It was still the mechanic when I started in '93, and I think it lasted for a few years after that.

And considering what you knew back then. . .

Hell, I knew <b>everything</b> back then!

That lasted until about my fifth year. It's been downhill ever since.

Strangely enough, one of the refs in the movie had his right sleeve (only) rolled about halfway up. He really looked goofy (no, not that Goofy).

Maybe it was before lanyards, and the idiot string got caught on his sleeve ?

FIBA (feeble)
 

This is still a mechanic in FIBA! (I think they don't trust their table people in europe:D )

My wife knitted me a pair of alligator mittens once(you made the alligator mouth with your four fingered mitt-part opposite the thumb) that had an idiot string on 'em. I was around 30 iirc and she made some for my kids; I thought they were way cool so she made me a pair too. I wore those mothers to more than a few games, I tell ya. JR makes a fashion statement.

It's true, it's true......seriously too.

Yeah - but how do they indicate the "two" in metric? Do they also have to raise 54/100ths of the next finger? ;)

http://chefmessy.typepad.com/chefmes...or_mittens.jpg

The Big Dawg has either seriously lost his street cred, or these are far enough out there that the cred has been permanently affixed.

That's them, that's them(excited as hell).....

And there's also nowayinhell that I'm posting that picture of Miss Cubs 2006 wearing 'em either that some nameless goof(coughM&Mcough) sent me either. I know I'm going to hell, but I'm not planning on doing so tonight though.

JR used to be the second best ref in his association.

Everyone else was tied for first.

Okay, let's see...

1959-60 subtracted from 2006-07, added to 16 y.o. and I get....

you're NOT Jurassic, you're only Cretaceous. You've been lying to us all these years!!!

I think that I first heard that one in 1959 too.

You're just jealous 'cause you don't have alligator mittens too. I can get my wife to knit ya a pair though. $721 plus freight and handling-COD. Guaranteeed to keep your hands warm during your football games("Ooooo....nice mittens, Mr. Refereee, nice mittens").:D

I'm a Cretin?

Hey, wait a minute.........

I have worked with a guy that flagged the two in the same way Winston Churchill gave the "V for victory" sign!!!

He couldn't of been a child of the 60's overwise the 2 fingers facing a more appropriate direction would have been a natural. mind you, when I pointed out to him what he'd done in our post game, it was the source of much laughter!

I bet she will! :D The alligator mittens will match my alligator polo shirt.

I knew you read the beisbol forums, but I didn't know you read the football forum too.

Yabut, ...there's a cream for that now !

So refs in the 60s were signaling a peace sign after every basket? :p

Ah, Jurassic, someone from my age group.:D I turned 16 in May of 1959.

End of October for me......Old Feller.:D

Did my first Varsity football game in September that year. Had my first communal post-game brown-pop <i>soiree</i> the same month. One of the Rites of Passage back then.