My Partner Quit

[JAdams]

Had three AAU girls games on Sunday...teams from three states, pretty good quality, ranging from 10-16 years of age. Partner was a long-time varsity-level official who has a well-known reputation of having a serious ego and a dominating way of working his games with coaches and his partner(s). In other words, a difficult partner to work with.

First game went fine. Second game was hotly contested, one coach in particular howling low-level throughout. Major controversy, however, involving time on the clock in the closing seconds. Partner wants to totally control the sitch, doesn't wany any help from me. OK, fine. Lots of yelling by both coaches and many fans; partner partially loses control.

Game ends, partner stuffs his game shoes in his gym bag, and loudly announces "I've had enough of this s***, I'm outta here," verbally abuses the timekeeper and me in front of both teams, and leaves in a huff. Also verbally tangles with a fan on the way out.

Another official from an adjacent floor did agree to stay, so we got the final game covered OK.

Questions: should I report this to the guy who assigned us to the tournament? What what would you say to this partner the next time you see him?

[Mark Padgett]

Originally posted by JAdams
Questions: should I report this to the guy who assigned us to the tournament?

Yes - absolutely.

What what would you say to this partner the next time you see him?

Nothing - because I would make it my business not to see him again.

[Marty Rogers]

I second Mark's reply.

[Brian Watson]

Originally posted by JAdams
Had three AAU girls games on Sunday...teams from three states, pretty good quality, ranging from 10-16 years of age. Partner was a long-time varsity-level official who has a well-known reputation of having a serious ego and a dominating way of working his games with coaches and his partner(s). In other words, a difficult partner to work with.

First game went fine. Second game was hotly contested, one coach in particular howling low-level throughout. Major controversy, however, involving time on the clock in the closing seconds. Partner wants to totally control the sitch, doesn't wany any help from me. OK, fine. Lots of yelling by both coaches and many fans; partner partially loses control.

Game ends, partner stuffs his game shoes in his gym bag, and loudly announces "I've had enough of this s***, I'm outta here," verbally abuses the timekeeper and me in front of both teams, and leaves in a huff. Also verbally tangles with a fan on the way out.

Another official from an adjacent floor did agree to stay, so we got the final game covered OK.

Questions: should I report this to the guy who assigned us to the tournament? What what would you say to this partner the next time you see him?

Who would you report him to? It is not an OHSAA contest, so they wouldn't care. I guess it would be up to the tourney director to hire him again, and I assume he knows what happened.

[Tim Roden]

Problem is that you probably will see him again. Maybe not on the same floor but in the same building. How are you going to handle it then is up to you. The best thing is to forgive him in your heart but put him on your "I will not call with" list.

I had to work with a guy who walked out on an official in the game before me. He walked out on that official and I finished his game. I heard nothing but bad about that official. The next week I walked into the building and found that guy as my partner. We had a good game because I never brought up the subject of last week.

[JRutledge]

Who in the heck are you going to report it to? And better yet, if you did report it who the hell would care? Even if you did report it, it is an AAU tournament. It is not like the people that run these things have their stuff together where the official would be hurt by anything that happens there. I have had more officials stop doing those tournaments or games that I know of all because of crap that happens to them. Really a lot of serious officials stay away from many of these leagues or tournaments because of all the crap that goes along with them. Or at least let me say this, the ones that have moved up or aspiring to move up only do these leagues if they are asked by assignors that actually assign during the regular season. And that is almost so rare that it never becomes an issue that I have ever seen. But then again where I live probably does not apply to where this took place.

I agree that this official probably did not handle the situation in the best way. He probably should have stuck it out. But I also admire that he had the balls to do that. Depending on what was happening, it is not our obligation to stay and get abused. I guess I would just have to be there.

Peace

[JAdams]

AAU tournaments around here are typically assigned by someone other than the high school assigners. My question in the first post above is a little unclear.. it should have been "should I tell the guy who assigned officials to the tournament?"

This particular AAU game was not that bad. It was the championship game of the U12 bracket, very well played by the players, and both coaches really wanted to win. The complaining coach is, in fact, a local HS girls varsity coach. Let's put it this way... I've heard a lot worse on Friday nights in February. If my partner can't take in step what was said, then he has awfully thin skin.

In my little corner of the world, these tournaments are often worked by full-fledged varsity officials. I guess it's a chance to stay active with a sport most of us really like.

[AK ref SE]

Not to stick up for the official that walked out, but, maybe something else was going on his life, maybe it was just a bad day, bad week. Maybe the official has thin skin, instead of reporting him, maybe asking, What happened? Might be a different avenue to take!
Just a thought!

AK ref SE

[BktBallRef]

Originally posted by JRutledge
Who in the heck are you going to report it to? And better yet, if you did report it who the hell would care? Even if you did report it, it is an AAU tournament.

Report him the heck to the person who assigned the officials for the tournament. How hard is that? At least you won't have to work with him again in an AAU tournament.

Originally posted by AK ref SE
Not to stick up for the official that walked out, but, maybe something else was going on his life, maybe it was just a bad day, bad week. Maybe the official has thin skin, instead of reporting him, maybe asking, What happened? Might be a different avenue to take!

I don't think I can be concerned with what else might be wrong in his life. He accepted the assignment. It's up to him to handle it professionally.

[AK ref SE]

BKTBALLREF-
So I guess you have been perfect your whole life, have been professional in everything you have ever done, never have had a bad day.
My hats off to ya!

AK ref SE

[ChuckElias]

Originally posted by AK ref SE
So I guess you have been perfect your whole life, have been professional in everything you have ever done, never have had a bad day.

Pretty obviously, Tony's not claiming perfection. Nowhere did he imply that. I agree with his point that even on the crappiest of days, we can't bring that onto the court. If an official is having that bad a stretch in his personal life, then turn back the assignment. It's only AAU, for crying out loud. If you can't deal with it, don't go out there. And no, I'm not perfect either. . . just ask my wife

Chuck

[mick]

Originally posted by BktBallRef

I don't think I can be concerned with what else might be wrong in his life. He accepted the assignment. It's up to him to handle it professionally.

Tony,
I'm with you there.
If he's having a bad day, he doesn't have to make me share his pain by stiffing me.
I ain't interested in his ego or his pride. He shoulda left that stuff in his car.
mick

[bigwhistle]

Originally posted by JRutledge
Who in the heck are you going to report it to? And better yet, if you did report it who the hell would care? Even if you did report it, it is an AAU tournament. It is not like the people that run these things have their stuff together where the official would be hurt by anything that happens there. I have had more officials stop doing those tournaments or games that I know of all because of crap that happens to them. Really a lot of serious officials stay away from many of these leagues or tournaments because of all the crap that goes along with them. Or at least let me say this, the ones that have moved up or aspiring to move up only do these leagues if they are asked by assignors that actually assign during the regular season. And that is almost so rare that it never becomes an issue that I have ever seen. But then again where I live probably does not apply to where this took place.

I agree that this official probably did not handle the situation in the best way. He probably should have stuck it out. But I also admire that he had the balls to do that. Depending on what was happening, it is not our obligation to stay and get abused. I guess I would just have to be there.

Peace

Rut,

Do you ever do anything for the good of the game, or to give back something to those people and the levels of play where you learned some valuable lessons (even though not always fun)?

Your posts are consistently derogatory against anything that you feel will not help YOU PERSONALLY move up. While you do have that right, it would be nice to hear encouraging things from you occasionally.

Just a thought, since you never know who may be in a position to help or hurt you somewhere down the road.

[zebraman]

I'm with Tony on this one. Any ref who isn't mature enough to leave the "off the court" stuff behind when reffing a game shouldn't be reffing in the first place. We all have bad days...none of us are immune to things weighing on us on game day, but we're professionals who have an obligation to leave it behind when we take the court. If it's so heavy that we can't leave it behind, turn the game back. It doesn't matter what level the game is, we owe the players our best effort.

I've seen a lot of crazy posts from Rut, but saying that he admires the ref for leaving is ludicrous. Rut's right that we don't have to tolerate being abused, but there are ways to handle out-of-line coaches and walking off the floor isn't one of them.

Report his unprofessional behavior to the assignor so none of the rest of us get stuck with him as our partner. :-)

Z

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by BktBallRef

Report him the heck to the person who assigned the officials for the tournament. How hard is that? At least you won't have to work with him again in an AAU tournament.

More than likely the assignor already knows what happened,
after all we do get paid for AAU games and the assignor
is reponsible for who gets paid what. In any event I agree,
give the assignor a phone call & let him know you're the one
who got screwed by this jerk.

Originally posted by BktBallRef

I don't think I can be concerned with what else might be wrong in his life. He accepted the assignment. It's up to him to handle it professionally.

I agree.