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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 09:11am
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I am an official in iowa. Sat. evening my partner and I did a JV-V girls game. It was a pretty sloppy game, dbl bonus both halves, a "T" was called ya'll know how it goes! after the game, we were in our dressing room. my part. was taking his shower and i had my towel on rdy for mine, when in walks the home coach. He slammed the game ball down and began to yell at me. "You guys suck!", "I don't ever want you guys back here again." I remained Professional asking the coach to please lv! He continued on his verbal onslaught. once again I asked him to lv. He continued. By this time my partner had arrived and I was heading to shut the door on this unprofessional head coach. As I reached for the door, the coachsays "don't you f--king touch me" and shoves me with both hands into a metal desk 4-5 ft away, giving me a nice bruise on my backside. I immediantly headed for the shower as to avoid this confrontation. The coach was hot on my tail. "And if you ever "T" one of my players again i will f--king kill you, I will beat u down!!!" Astonished, i went to take my shower. 2-3 min later i returned to find the coach still there giving it to my partner. At this point my partner and i were not responding to anything the coach had to say. No eye contact, no response, nothing! we just started getting dressed, as we were naked thru this entire 10-12 min ordeal! And the coach finally left. After all this was over my partner and I were shell-shocked, the coaches team won by 19pts.!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is an unbeleivable chain of events, one that I wish none of you ever have to go thru! And beleive me fellow officials, we were not THAT bad on this particular evening. Anyways pls respond. my partner and I would love our fellow officials comments and advice on this situation. out. 
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 09:39am
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OUCH!! Sounds like you both handled it as well as could be, esp. staying calm, asking him repeatedly to leave, and then just "ignoring" him. If there was no way to walk out and get somebody to help get him out of there (since you were both naked), what more could you do. I might have thrown some pants and shirt on and left anyway to find someone, but letting him run his mouth without retaliating verbally or otherwise was probably wise. Saying or doing anything else could only make it worse. Of course, now the test is whether the school, your officials association and/or the state association will respond to that coach in a satisfactory manner after getting your report. And what about the local law enforcement? They should probably be informed of the physical threat so they at least have it on record. Anyway, good job of handling it, I'd say. (I've had a similar situation once in my career, but not near to the extent of your's--just the swearing and yelling, but no threats.)
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 11:32am
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I will be taking my cell phone with me from now on. And I will tell the assaulting coach to leave or I will call 1. the AD, 2. the principal, 3. the police. And yes, I do carry all those phone numbers with me.
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 11:38am
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I certainly hope that you have written a letter to the state association, the local school board, and the AD of the school describing this chain of events. Also I hope that your partner saw the push as well. I would file a report with the police charging this fine person with assalt and battery.
He needs to spend a night or two in jail. I think you handled yourself very well in this case and gave no reason for the coach to be further provoked. Send a letter to NASO as well. ------------------ Ron Seattle Officials - Women's Basketball [This message has been edited by Ron Pilo (edited January 20, 2000).]
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 11:50am
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Ron has given great advice. Do not allow this situation to just "go away." Write as many letters as possible, to as many people as possible, who have a stake in this situation. I'm sorry you had to go through this!
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 12:39pm
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I echo everything Ron said.
In the state of Oklahoma, there is a law specifically protecting game officials. This coach would have been guilty of a Gross Misdemeanor, and would have some significant penalty. (Helps to have a referee in the state legislature.) I'd also make sure that your referee's association is well aware of this, they should take a stand against this guy. Any school/district/state worth it's salt suspends this guy for at least the season. I would think he should be out of a job. ------------------ Brian Johnson
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 01:32am
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This is a great idea for the future!!! Thank you
[ quote]Originally posted by Just Ref on 01-20-2000 10:32 AM I will be taking my cell phone with me from now on. And I will tell the assaulting coach to leave or I will call 1. the AD, 2. the principal, 3. the police. And yes, I do carry all those phone numbers with me.[/quote]
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 03:32pm
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All of the above advice sounds great. I would also recommend (maybe I missed someone else mentioning this) that you have your LOCAL OFFICIATING BOARD send a letter giving your side of the story and the consequences if anything happens like this again in the future to the same people Ron mentioned. Good luck.
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 05:37pm
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Thanks to new legislation, if that had happened here in Oregon, that coach would be charged with a class A misdemeanor, carrying an automatic fine between $500 - $1000 payable to the official, plus we would encourage the official to file a civil suit as well.
The first phone call we tell our officials to make is to the police. To get help with this type of legislation in your state, contact Bob Still at NASO. [email protected]
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 06:39pm
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I have a friend who carries a voice activated tape recorder with him.
After a game he immediately takes it out and places it on a table in the officials dressing room and covers it with a t-shirt. Yes, he gets lots of conversations about the ballgames, but in the event the above happens, he has it all on tape!
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Thu Jan 20, 2000, 10:49pm
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Your first stop should have been to the local police deptartment, where you should have called your referee president. The second thing then would be to contact your state athletic asociation. You handled everything else well, the physical aspect is a real tragedy! The school's AD should be informed and action taken, your referee association should not send any referee's to this school until they feel satisfied that the coach has been dealt with!
------------------ Don
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Fri Jan 21, 2000, 12:27am
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Here's my response.
Never 'ask' a coach to leave, DEMAND it! Once the coach physically 'pushed' you, you have every LEGAL right to defend yourself within reason. Within reason, would mean that I would drag his #*#@ out of MY dressing area and use whatever technique (except knives, guns, etc.) I could manage. Forget whether I was naked, half-dressed, or totally dressed, his butt would be out of my dressing room!!! I hate that any official, at any level, whether it was well-officiated or not, would have to endure such a situation. This clown has absolutely NO BUSINESS being in anyone's school district. And the most unfortunate aspect is his punishment will not fit his behavior. He'll tell everyone he was abused as a child and that he couldn't control himself. The school board will declare that the coach is a 'victim' and demand that he seek counseling for RAGE CONTROL. Don't laugh, a similar circumstance happened in Tennessee at the grade school level, and that was the result. Fortunately, a principle with high character, a couple of months later, dismissed him. But, I don't think he went to Iowa. KDM
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Fri Jan 21, 2000, 09:43am
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quote: Demand that he leave, YES! But beyond that, retaliating physically to drag his *** out of there is totally inappropriate. I'm sure the urge would be there, but we have to step above such recourse. Walking away, then dealing with the incident later was absolutely the right way to go. I can only imagine the brawl that could have erupted had an effort been made to FORCE the coach out. Doing so would have only made the situation worse, and resulted in lost credibility for the official who tried. Defend yourself, yes. But do everything you can to deflate the situation, without escalating it instead. The "powers that be" are the people who need to take strong action after the fact to ensure it never happens again. By the way, let us know how this all turns out.
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Fri Jan 21, 2000, 01:40am
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quote: Todd, I hear you. But diplomacy doesn't always work. This guy came in and assaulted one of the officials. What if the official received a broken bone or severe cut rather than a 'nice bruise' on his backside? You would have to draw a line somewhere .... and I draw my line with the act of a physical assault and not necessarily the severity of that act. At what point do you deem it "appropriate" to retaliate or would you ever? How would anyone know that the coach wouldn't assault anymore? This was a dangerous situation with an out-of-control bully. The heck with ... as you said, 'losing credibility' as an official. I want to add credibility with my full-time employer and my family by not getting hurt to the point that I would have to miss work and place my family into an economic hardship. It only takes one incident and one injury to destroy or hamper your life. And I'll be darned if I'll allow myself to remain in a situation with an out-of-control coach who could, at any time, attack me! Officiating is important to me ... but not that important. KDM
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Fri Jan 21, 2000, 02:57pm
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quote: Yup, it IS a tough call as to how best to deal with it. As the "push" was described, it was in reaction to what the coach considered touching him and resulted in a relatively minor injury. Totally unacceptable, but in terms of deflating the situation the victimized official still had a better chance of avoiding further physical injury by walking away and dealing with it through channels. If the coach would not leave it at that and comes toward you again, absolutely you have to defend yourself however you can--but the key word there is "defend" as opposed to retaliate. And, of course, only the people who are actually in the situation as it is occurring can really judge whether physical defense is necessary and what level of action. But I still think walking away is the better first choice IF it is feasible. And while credibility is absolutely secondary and not exactly on your mind at the time, how you handle such a situation will, nonetheless, have an impact since it demonstrates how you handle a highly pressured situation and how your decision-making is affected. Thank goodness most officials never have to experience this type and degree of incident.
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