Thin Skinned? (Semi Long)

[DrakeM]

Ok.
I'll tell the story and welcome your input.
Last night. State AAU Tournament.
Game is going fine, two competitive teams. We did have to
tell the Assistant for one team to please sit down.
I believe the verbatim was "We can only have one coach
up please." Despite this fact, the assistant would still get up from time to time. If he was talking to kids on the bench we allowed it. Late third quarter, Substitute walks to the table after the free throw shooter has the ball, shot is missed then goes out of bounds (2nd shot). I will admit to forgetting about the sub, but as my partner is getting ready to inbound the ball, the assistant stands up and YELLS "SUUUUUBBBBBB!" I mean YELLS!!!!!!
(Table didn't buzz sub in either, by the way.)
So I turn around and tell assistant to sit down and that I'd heard enough. He sits down shaking his head.
Fourth quarter, I'm trail. Play at the basket, shot attempt is blocked, Head Coach wants a foul, I clap hands together indicating I saw a good block. ( By the way, I try not to use this technique until I'm questioned about a play so I don't have my partner signalling for a foul and I'm smaking my hands together.) As we head the other way, assistant starts shaking his head and says out-loud, "that's unbelievable!" I'd had enough."Tweet" Wack!
Of course they don't like it. I get away from the benches and stand at midcourt while my partner administers free throws. I then hear the assistant "clapping" his hands and saying "good job" in my general direction. I glance to make sure what's going on. He make eye contact with me and again
claps and makes snide comments. "tweet" wack! Toss!
Assistant is now gone.
Anyway, after the game, I'm talking to the head coach whose
assistant was tossed, my partner is talking to his wife, who I just happened to go to High School with. She comments to my partner that "He is just too thin skinned."
What do you think.
Understanding that we all have different boiling points,
Honest critique will be gladly accepted.

[Brian Watson]

I think the first one was earned, it is not like you didn't warn him enough.

And for the second, nothing grates me more than when a coach is showing you up, but trys to hide it by saying he was talking to his kids (I know you didn't say that happended, but this sounds like one of those times). I say he deserved the second one too. If he is dumb enough to keep it up after you make eye contact to let him know you hear him, then he deserves what he gets.

As for the wife, who cares. He could have thrown a chair across the lane during those T shots and she would have said you were too thin skinned for running him.

[Jurassic Referee]

Drake,it's not even a question of being thin-skinned.
1)it was an assistant coach.
2)he crapped on you.
3)he then tried to make you look like an idiot.
4)this is AAU ball,not the NCAA tournament.
Don't worry about this one(somehow I think you really aren't,anyway).The next ref that gets this clown owes you a vote of thanks for taking care of business.

[devdog69]

None of us can really judge what was really going on because we weren't there, we can, however, pull from our own experiences in similar circumstances. The assistants behavior at these types of games is horrible in many circumstances. I believe we all need to make a genuine attempt to educate them as to what will be tolerated, then take care of business. If we all worked together, which won't happen, it would be easier for those of us determined to do it right. I have promised myself that when I work these non-scholastic sanctioned tournaments this summer that I will not put up with the assistant coaches getting out of line. It distracts me very much when I have two people up and down the sideline yelling at me or the kids. I am talking about continuosly up throughout the game, not just an isolated incident here or there. I think you did what you had too, Drake. 1) You asked them to sit the assistant 2) You took care of business when you had had enough 3) You were showed up by the guy and that is not acceptable, so you took care of business again. As far as what the lady said, she obviously doesn't know didly. Even if you are more thin-skinned than some of the refs they are seeing in these tournaments, that is probably because you are confident enough to know how much to let go before making a stand, some of the other officials they are seeing will barely blow the whistle, much less know anything about game management.

[ChuckElias]

My personal philosophy is included in the thread "Pre-game notes (not copywrited)". I posted my entire pregame notebook and one of the items is:

"Assistant coaches get no latitude".

As soon as an assistant barks at me, I tell the coach only he can talk to me. Next time is a T. I don't care what is said. T the assistant early and often. Just my opinion. I have enough to deal with, without listening to two uninformed coaches.

Chuck

[DrakeM]

You know Chuck,
I normally have the same philosophy.
The problem is I was dropped from State Playoffs this year for handling an assistant in this manner. Warning, inappropriate comment,"T". Complaint by losing team that got "T", done with playoffs.
So I think I'm just trying to figure out if I need to change
my way of thinking.
I admit I normally have a quicker trigger than alot of referees.
I think it is as devdog says, I just know what I will take and what I won't.
I've been taught by some pretty good people and I try to
handle things in a similar manner as they would.
I'm always learning and tweeking though.

[Bart Tyson]

Originally posted by DrakeM
Ok.
Sometimes we officials don't help our cause by the way we deal with assistant coaches. I try to treat all coaches with much respect. That doesn't mean the asst. has the latitude as the Head Coach. Having said this, I do agree this is not ncaa ball, so I would not want to hear much from the asst.

I will admit to forgetting about the sub, but as my partner is getting ready to inbound the ball, the assistant stands up and YELLS "SUUUUUBBBBBB!" I mean YELLS!!!!!!

Ok you forgot, but the asst. reminded you. why couldn't you just blow the whistle, bring in the subs, turn to the asst. and say "thanks coach".

As we head the other way, assistant starts shaking his head and says out-loud, "that's unbelievable!" I'd had enough."Tweet" Wack!

Good job.

Of course they don't like it. I get away from the benches and stand at midcourt while my partner administers free throws. I then hear the assistant "clapping" his hands and saying "good job" in my general direction. I glance to make sure what's going on. He make eye contact with me and again
claps and makes snide comments. "tweet" wack! Toss!
Assistant is now gone.

Good job.

Last thought, You might see some assistant coaches as Head coaches someday.

[stripes]

Drake,

I think you handled the situation "by the book". Remember that the penalized rarely (if ever) feel like they deserve the penalties they receive. You gave the asst plenty of chances to do his job before the 1st and responses like his should get the second as quickly as we can get the whistle in our mouths.

This reminds me of a couple of games I did last summer in a tournament. Game 1 asst gets a T for talking inappropriately. Game 2 (two weeks later) asst gets T for being too demonstrative after no call. At halftime asst come up to me (very friendly) and wants to talk about the T. He thinks that the T is a holdover from the first game. He goes on at length about it. I finally tell him that he is an assistant coach and that the bench decorum regarding assistant coaches is very different than for head coaches and until he understands what acceptable behavior by an assistant is, he will get more Ts. He looks at me like I have 3 eyes and walks away. I said to my partner, there goes a guy who will never get it. BTW, most never do.

Good job Drake.

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by DrakeM
You know Chuck,
I normally have the same philosophy.
The problem is I was dropped from State Playoffs this year for handling an assistant in this manner. Warning, inappropriate comment,"T". Complaint by losing team that got "T", done with playoffs.
So I think I'm just trying to figure out if I need to change
my way of thinking.
I admit I normally have a quicker trigger than alot of referees.
I think it is as devdog says, I just know what I will take and what I won't.
I've been taught by some pretty good people and I try to
handle things in a similar manner as they would.
I'm always learning and tweeking though.

I think Jurassic & Chuck summed it up for me. You did your
job by trying to talk this guy out of being a jerk, he
just refused to cooperate. Obviously he did not understand
his job. As for your tweaking, I think we can divide the
basketball world up into two parts: real basketball and the
rest of basketball. Certainly rec/AAU does not qualify
as real basketball for many good reasons. In a real game
you might have held off on the second T. So don't sweat it.

Also, and FWIW, I try to direct all warnings to the
assistant coach through the head coach. This let's him know
that it's now his job to leash his assistant. I'm sure
you know this, just throwing it in...

[Mark Dexter]

First off, Drake, let me sympathize with you for not getting assignments because you actually call technical fouls. I'm sure everyone here is familiar with how many I call.

That said, calling the T's here is not being thin-skinned, it's having cojones (with apologies to Madeline Albright). Just realize that losing players/coaches/fans are not in their right mind. About 2 weeks ago, I forfeited an indoor soccer semi-final tournament game. I was working the game alone, had ejected three players on one team (this was in a 5 on 5 game), and had a near riot on my hands on the crowd, so I called the game (of course, the losing team was well behind at the time). As I was talking with my supervisor about the game, one of the players came up to me and said "You can't call a game because your feelings are hurt." Obviously, that was a load of you know what and this coach's wife's comment was as well.

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by Mark Dexter

...
That said, calling the T's here is not being thin-skinned, it's having cojones (with apologies to Madeline Albright).

Madeline Albright? I'm sure she does not have cajones,
although she looks like she should.

[Bart Tyson]

Originally posted by Dan_ref


Madeline Albright? I'm sure she does not have cajones,
although she looks like she should. [/B]

Annnnd, you know this ... How?

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by Bart Tyson

Annnnd, you know this ... How? [/B]

I checked, how else would I know?

[ChuckElias]

Originally posted by DrakeM
The problem is I was dropped from State Playoffs this year for handling an assistant in this manner. Warning, inappropriate comment,"T". Complaint by losing team that got "T", done with playoffs.

Drake, was this your state's high school tournament? If so, then I have to say that you got completely screwed. Every year, the state boards and IAABO tell us how important it is for our games to have good sportsmanship. In fact, wasn't bench decorum a POE this year for high schools? Yes, I just checked my notes -- it was!

So you went out and did your job the way we're told to do it and you got scratched b/c the losing coach complained. That's unbelievable.

Personally, I think you acted correctly in the situations you describe. Perhaps, tho, you need to discuss the issue with somebody in your association who would have more insight than I have. Although, to be honest, I can't think of what they'd tell you. "Yes, please ignore the POE's during the postseason so we don't slow down the games."

Chuck

[ChuckElias]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Dan_ref

Madeline Albright? I'm sure she does not have cajones,
although she looks like she should.

I wouldn't be too sure about it. From what I read at the time, when President Clinton told his cabinet and advisors that the Monica Lewinsky story was true, Secretary Albright was "extremely vocal" in expressing her displeasure at having been deceived about the affair. That had to take major cajones to scream at a sitting President in the Oval Office.

Chuck