T for 2
 

I've averaged about 1 head coach technical per season the last 3-4 years. They just (normally) don't cross the line in varsity contests around here.

Today I was working a boys varsity 2-person and a ball was stolen near the division line (the visiting coach wanted a foul) and naturally there's a shooting foul soon thereafter.

I'm reporting. The coach is LOUD. He finished with "that's terrible, you're just making a bunch of crap up." That caught my attention.

In the fourth quarter, my partner called a foul against the home team and as he was reporting a teammate walked past me and untucked his jersey and lifted the bottom over (and covered) his head.

At least my varsity girls game tonight was quiet.

automatic T

perhaps flagrant.

Everybody sets their own line when it comes to "T"s. But in my experience, very few officials that I know would view that remark as being worthy of an ejection. I'm in that camp also.

Technical foul, yes. Flagrant, no.

I made it this far in the season with just one T, but I had two yesterday in about 5 seconds. Men's rec (duh). Guy griping a little bit here and there most of the game, then with about 3 minutes left he loses his cool on a no-call and cries about it as we go down to the other end, so I pin him. As I report he walks by me and quietly says "kick me out too" so I did! :D

The home coach couldn't believe I called a technical for the kid pulling his jersey over his head. He asked, "what else did he do?" I simply said, "that's all it took."

This was the same guy who told me I was out of position about 30 seconds into the game. 2-person. I'm lead opposite. Ball goes out tableside sideline -- I didn't even know it went out until I heard this whistle, BTW -- I was watching the post-play dance underneath. Bump and run. As I was coming in front of his bench as the new trail, the coach said I should've been in position to help my partner out there. It was so absurd I actually laughed.

He then accused me of being out of position at a critical juncture late. Rebound kicked out wide and his player took it with his back to the bucket (about 82 feet away). He simply turned to dribble up the floor and a defender was right there and he bumped into the guy and fell to the floor. I called a travel. The defender had position and there was no foul to be called, really. He told me I missed the bump and was out of position. Given the comment in the first minute, I'm thinking he thinks "in position" means standing in his coaching box.

It was a long day. We finished the 2:30PM game about 4:15 and I had to get on the road to meet our third at 5PM and drive about an hour to our 7:15PM game, which was actually more fun to work than the afternoon game (it was 3-person and wasn't frantic, out-of-control action the whole game). The first beer tasted good, as did the burger. Pulled into the house about 12:30AM.

No way it was flagrant. It was a garden variety technical foul. The coach even told me at halftime (he walked right past us at halfcourt) he wasn't meaning for it to be heard by the stands and he was just firing up the team. As I told him earlier, it was forgotten as soon as I administered it and my partner sat him down (he talked at my partner for over a minute during the 4 FTs and not once did he ask a question, so my partner didn't say a single word) and I said it again and he didn't act up the rest of the game.

It's not like he said we were cheating or anything.

Yes, that is all it takes


The second time the coach mention anything about positioning, I always mention that he is here to coach his kids and if he is watching my positioning his team is not obviously being coached. That usually solves the problem

-Josh

Fixed it for ya'. ;)

I agree with jdmara. I think chirping about positioning needs to be cut off ASAP. I will usually address something related specifically related to position (i.e. "You've got to get in position to see that!") the first time. Something more indirect (i.e. "You called that and your partner was standing right in front of it and didn't have anything?!) might be ignored the first time, but certainly needs to be addressed if it's a repeated thing.

Like jdmara said, usually a quick word like "I'm not going to tell you how to coach, Coach, so let me take care of the officiating" will take care of things.

Eh, it was first minute and last minute. The first one rolled off the books by then. It wasn't the time or place. By then we were into free throw land and I was trying to keep things moving.

It would depend.. it might be a technical, might not.

Either way, it's certainly not flagrant.

It is interesting to get people's take on how things should be called. Not long ago we had a thread and it involved a coach attacking an officials integrity and cheating his team. Many people deemed that to be flagrant yet apparently this is different?

Personally, I can't foresee any circumstance where I wouldn't call this T; and if I though the coach was honestly accusing me of making up the rules, it might be flagrant. The thing is, it's a throw-away-comment for some coaches, like "call it both ways."

The latter is, really, an accusation of cheating if you look at the words used. The intent, however, is rarely that nefarious, so it's hardly ever called a flagrant. In the case of the assistant coach who blatantly and purposefully accused the officials of cheating his kids, however, he's done; for two reasons.

1. He's an assistant coach. Far less leeway and benefit of the doubt.
2. He'd already been warned, and proceeded to escalate his comments to the accusation. I'm assuming he means it as it came out in this case; and even a head coach would likely get an ejection seat.

And I personally don't regard that as a throw-away comment. I regard it as an attack on my integrity and I won't put up with it. It's a warning followed by a "T" if the coach is dumb enough to say it again to me. When someone says something like that, imo they're accusing me of being biased.

You can question my judgment but I won't let anyone question my integrity.

Every official has a different line in the sand and a different trigger. That's one of mine. It's up to the coaches to figure out what they can get away with in any particular game. If you let them know, they should have no complaint later if they do cross an official's personal line and get nailed after being warned.

IMO, it's worse than that. Bias is a matter of attitude. But the only reason to say "call it both ways" is if the official is NOT calling it both ways, that is, acting unfairly.

That's an accusation of cheating. One approach is to ask the coach, "Are you aware that you're accusing me of cheating?" Usually they're not.