4 T's in Season opener

[tomegun]

Originally Posted by shishstripes

I would say to try and avoid that many T's try to officiate more without the whistle. Some things are going to happen but what can we say or do off the ball or while are partner is reporting to try and circumvent poor decisions by individual players?

When players come in did the same number go out? Are we communicating as partners before putting the ball in play? Would closing on the play and getting frustrated players to go where they belong possibly keep them from doing something stupid? Unless a kid is trying to be sneaky and hide from you in a far corner, I never want to call 6 players on the court personally.

Maybe some of the more veteran officials have other ideas of what we can do to try and keep from calling many T's.

I disagree this this line of thinking for any game and especially for 3 out of the 4 T's called in this situation. How could he have talked to players during a dead ball to keep them from grabbing the rim or slapping the backboard? OK, so there is two of the four right there. Additionally, I'm not going to rush in to console a player because he doesn't like my partner's call or a call I made so the kid who slammed the ball is on his/her own. Finally, I would like to hear more details about how 6 players ended up on the floor. Like someone said, ultimately we cannot prevent everything and it sounds like this was two-man game which means two fewer eyes to see things.

I always cringe when I hear of officials counting T's, discouraging T's or worrying about T's. It is easier to stop calling them than to start, but I haven't witnessed any drop off in the amount of unsporting actions in basketball games so why should the T's decrease? I think we should call more because the game, and our society as a whole, is getting worse by the minute.