my first coach T in two years, yuk

[Mark Dexter]

Originally posted by devdog69
9-1-5 ...No opponent shall disconcert the free thrower.

I called it last night on a girl behind the shooter. She would walk up behind the shooter and stand, innocently enough, but then as the shooter would start her motion she would squeak her shoes on the floor. After it happened three or four times it was obvious it was intentional. I called it once, it was over no biggie, did consider that I probably could have just said "hey don't do that" and it would have stopped too.

I almost had a call like this last week. I'm trail, and A1 has two free throws. On the first throw, B1 stands immediately behind the 3pt line, leans as close to the shooter as possible and starts talking (in an obvious attempt to disconcert the shooter). 1st shot goes in, and I tell B1 if he does that again, it's disconcertion.

Of course, I get the "I'm innocent" look, and questions about how that can be against the rules.

(The players also don't seem to understand that coming into the 3pt arc or switching spots are violations after the shooter has the ball. Also, everyone thinks we are playing college ball and goes on the release. )

[dblref]

williebfree & M. Padgett: My bad, I should have explained it better. We aren't required to report the admin T's. This past year we did see an increase in the number of T's called -- particularly by the non-varsity officials. I had 2 last year and both were deserved. I usually have thick skin but some things I simply will not tolerate.

[BktBallRef]

The NCHSAA required us to report all technicals on players, bench personnel and coaches 4 years ago. Fortunately, I believe I had two that year.

[Hawks Coach]

how do these associations use these reports - see who gives out too many Ts, deal with problem schools, coaches, or just fill a file drawer? Do they come back to you and question you about the report you have filed, either to get more info against the school or to counsel you on your game management?

[BktBallRef]

I believe in our situation, they were hoping to address problem issues with coaches and players. This was during a period when we were reading a sportsmanhip statement during the captains meeting. The two were hand in hand.

[dblref]

Hawks Coach:

In our association, the assignor wants to see if there is a trend/tendency on a particular school or official or both. In regards to the official, it may (and I emphasize may) be that the official is using the T in place of good game management. We have a couple of officials (varsity) that will T you at the drop of a hat. They are both good officials (mechanics, rules, positioning, etc), but they are T happy. The nuber of T's also count in determining the school sportsmanship award.

[Doug]

I posted yesterday about "drawing the line" for a coach and players, and lo and behold, i used the information last night. 8th grade girls tourney, into the 2nd to last game, the 5th i had done in a row. we were a few min into the first quarter, assistant coach (varsity coach of the high school) gets up and starts yelling "je**** Ch**** reff, do you know how to call a foul?" boom, i t'd him up, green, pick a shooter. coach gets up again, "hey reff, did that make you feel any better?" I walked over to the head coach and told her that her assistant could not be off the bench at any time, for any reason, she starts yelling that he is the head coach, but is sitting and acting as the assistant, he was written as the assistant on the sheet thing at the scorers table, so he was the assistant. then, i went to administer the technical. was this the correct procedure?

[devdog69]

Doug, this is a problem area that I saw all day yesterday too. Had a JV tournament and several times the "assistant coach" was up off the bench either coaching or arguing calls. I just don't tolerate it from the assistant and in my case I got it stopped before they caused a problem. At the first opportunity, I went to the "head coach" and said "coach, your assistant can't be up off the bench for any reason during a live ball, help me out please". I usually give it a laugh and smile because everybody knows that now I've got some first year timid, new assistant telling the head varsity coach to have a seat. In your case, I believe when he said "did that make you feel better", I would have taken that as a personal remark and given him a second and removed him. I know that is a move that we all hate to make, but you were clearly justified in the first technical, and he was clearly out of line in the second comment. I don't think you would have any problems getting backup on this situation. Otherwise, sounds like you handled it well, nice job.

[devdog69]

Oh, and by the way, I had the same coach again on Saturday that I T'ed on Thursday night (the one I started this thread about). They were warming up at halftime of my first game and I told my partner "I'm going to take care of this right now". I went over and said "coach, is there anything we need to discuss from the other night?". She was very nice, said she was upset about my partner's call going against her in a tight game and was sorry, denied having said that we suck, she claimed it was "that's ridiculous". We then had a nice conversation about personal things (I knew her brother 5 or 6 years back) and everything went great. I believe this approach worked wonderfully in this situation, as I did not want any hard feelings carrying over into another game, and think this let the coach know that would be the case from my angle also. Just thought I would pass that on, may help some newbies handle coaches better. I wouldn't have have guts enough to approach a coach like this last season, but I have forced myself to work very hard on giving coaches the respect they deserve (when they deserve it, of course). This has helped my game management skills tremendously. Since I am obviously not perfect, one thing I probably did do wrong yesterday was let the fans get to me. One team had about two dozen fans that were very boisterous and loud, counting seconds in the lane all the way up to 9 or 10 (even when there wasn't anyone in there), telling me to "watch 31 she's holding in there" during dead balls. I finally let it get to me, and responded to one lady during the first of a two shot free throw when she told me to watch the three seconds. I said "lady, as long as you are yelling about it, I ain't gonna call it, you keep quiet and I'll get it". She said "oh", and some guy said "see". I know I shouldn't have, but it seemed to work at the time, btw, I never called it and told my partner at halftime (before I said this to her) that if he called it I would shoot him. I got a kick out of it because I stayed and watched two games after I was done to help out a couple of newer guys with mechanics and this same team was playing. They got a three second call in the third quarter of that game and I was sitting at the scorers table with my uniform and jacket on and I see this lady in the stands pointing at me and laughing because they finally got a call. I gave the touchdown signal to her and laughed about it to which she either thought was funny or I was the biggest smartass alive, but she was pointing and telling all the other parents about it.

[Doug]

ha, good to know i am not the only one who gets a little cocky when it comes to nasty people. I try not to, but sometimes it just happens. after the games, i had the tournament director come up to me in the hallway, and said, "hey, i heard you gave the gun to a coach" i said yes, and told him what happened. it was interesting, and a learning expierence, a good story

[Hawks Coach]

My two cents dev - avoid these interactions with the crowd. This gives you the appearance of playing to the crowd (especially the second incident). It may seem all in fun, but you are not there to entertain.

We had some real crowd problems with one team at our last tournament, a fan ended up getting ejected, the supervisor of the officials' org was in another gym in the school and was summoned, and I think the whole thing was made worse by a ref who got two involved with the crowd. They're not part of the game, and you don't want to bring them into it.