My least favorite is "DIG DIG DIG DIG DIG DIG!!!"

So you've already showed your hand and know nothing about how the game is played. As a professional your best response is that its annoying.

I think Rich meant that screaming at opponents during traps, dead balls and throw-ins ("BALL, BALL, BALL!") is classically a girls ball tactic. I would agree. Of course good defense needs communication in the scenarios you mentioned above. These are two different things.

Edit: Rich clarified this while I was typing my response. Redundant.

Wow, you must really be an amazing coach if you can gauge my skills as an official just by a few message board posts....

Exactly.

Of course the coach would rather come on here and insinuate I know nothing about basketball even though he knows nothing at all about me.

In the situations where good communication is necessary, officials don't even notice. It's part of the game and blends right into the "beautiful noise" of the game itself.

He's talking about the "ball ball ball ball" stuff. When the ball gets buried in a trap, I'll normally hear them call out "dead" or something, but it's not continuous. Maybe it's the altitude here, but they tend to think there are better things to do with their oxygen than expell it for the purpose of distracting an opponent.

Talking to communicate is one thing; talking to distract, intimidate, or produce anxiety in the opponent is another.

Not that I deal with it in anyway; it's all perfectly legal even if it is considered bush league. Now, counting on an throw-in is different.

And if a coach were to approach me pregame and try to tell me his intent for doing this, I'd very specifically tell him not to do it. At this point, I probably wouldn't bother with a warning in the game, either.

Oh...well...I thought he was talking about me...:D

Maybe he was. You know how thin-skinned we officials are. ;)

I've been many DI, DII, DIII college games and the better teams are always talking. Especially in traps. Why? All in an attempt to raise the anxiety level in your opponent. Just like anything in life when anxiety is high people panic and make poor decisions. We like to cause panic. Thats why teams that play us turn the ball over 21 times per game and average more than two 5sec. violations per game.

Coach, do you really think we care about your coaching successes in here? Seriously? No more than you care which officials who have already responded to you have worked state championship games (hint, not me).

Ok, coach, you win. You're a great coach. You rock. You're awesome. Do whatever you want during the game. We don't care.

Not trying to blow my own horn simply attemting to make a point of the style of basketball that I teach. I teach my players to communicate....an important life lesson. I teach my players to play with sportsmanship and we don't taunt or talk to refs. Nor do we show negative body language. But, as a professional in my field I recognize that I don't have all the answers. So what better place to go than to officiating.com to get a professional answer. Then only professional answer was to refer to 10-4-1b...but that was followed by "bad, bad coach." I guess i'll have to sign on with a different user name and say i'm a new referee and i have a question. Saying I am a coach without a doubt brings negativity with some high strung refs.

That's not true. Verbal communication should be a form of communicating amongst team player and/or raising the adrenaline of the communicating player. As an official, I'm not annoyed by these "talking tactics". I think it can be good basketball to use verbal activity to raise ones playing level. HOWEVER, if its evident that a player or coach's verbal activity is intended to directly inhibit the other team (and usually its apparent when it happens), I will without fail consider it unsporting.

Gee, I thought it was me....oh wait, I haven't posted in this thread yet..:D

Just a bit about the way things work here, you'll note he added the smiley face. He was chiding you a bit; it's what we do and it was done in fun at the time.

You got the reference, a lot of concurring opinions, and not a single dissenting opinion. You've got representative opinions from officials all over the country, and it's unanimous.

FWIW, a "new official" would have gotten the same response. A "new official" who argued with the response would have gotten an even worse follow-up response.