I too started very late in life. The third of my four daughters (11yrs old) has been going to games with me from the beginning and this year she officiated with me at some volunteer church ball games. She says she wants to be a nurse (like her mother) and a ref. After watching me for the past few years she has a pretty good handle on the rules and the mechanics.

It sure is fun to have her tag along and spend that time with me. The youngest (9 yrs old) says she likes to tag along also - but she really just likes to hit the concession stand.

+1

Oh yeah...(change your sig line)

My father didn't officiate but went to quite a few of my baseball games and even a couple of football games. I'm hoping when I eventually spawn that I can share my love of officiating with my kids.

Which means he was still 'officiating' but it was "outside the lines" and he wasn't getting paid and certainly not in proper uniform.....;)
He has since reformed and is a most venerable member of our brotherhood, if only to assuage the guilt for his behavior while coaching:D

Hehe...I resemble that, too.

I'm trying to get my 14 yr old son involved and so far he's luke warm. he's umping our local house league this spring so hopefully he'll get the bug.

I'm mentoring a friend of mine's 17 yr old son who has yet to ref a game, but has shadowed a few times. He has good DNA as his uncle was a superbowl white hat not too long ago.

I kick myself everyday for not getting into officiating earlier. Thankfully, I finally made the plunge.

As long as I can remember my dad has officiated basketball & I grew up in the gym. When I was about 12, in 7th grade he gave me a whistle & a shirt. I did 3rd grade church league. Every year I go work an 8th grade tournament game with him. Last year when I got to work a 1st round game in the DIII womens tourney he was there to videotape it, he was very proud. (so proud that if you heard him tell it you would have thought I was working the final four...:)

I know I've mentioned this before, but I have a brother-in-law that also officiated basketball - once - in a movie. It was "The Temp" and it was filmed here in Portland in (I think) 1999. It starred Timothy Hutton and Lara Flynn Boyle. My brother-in-law played a middle school ref. He was, in real life, a middle school PE teacher at the school where the scene was filmed, so they asked him to be in the scene as the ref, mostly because he's very athletic and quite tall. He played football and baseball in HS and college and played minor league ball for a few years in the Mets organization until he injured his knee.

Great Story!
 

Ain't nuthin like a proud papa!

My dad and mom have only seen me ref one game. Unfortunately, I was pressed into service at my son's Rec Game several yrs ago as a ref was a no show........you can imagine.

The game was in a cafagymateria with a really slick, tile floor. At one point my son loses his footing and goes down to the floor. TWEEET! Travel! Wham! He slams the ball down! Whack! I award my FIRST T Ever!

They won, but it was a very cold, quiet ride home in that car......thankfully, it was a short ride. :o

Bully for the two of you!!!;)

Your story was sooo funny to me because I had a VERY similar situation! When my daughter was about 12 or 13 one of ref's didn't show and since I was there and had a whistle...everything went fine until my daughter gets a steal, goes in for the layup but the defender beats her down the court and is waiting for her, easy, I call a charge, my daughter slams the ball down, I call a T, and she goes to the bench crying. I don't think she talked to me for a week! :) She's 20 and still brings it up every now and then!!

That is a great story. My dad never got to see me work any big games but he loved to come watch me umpire little league games when I was a teenager.

Great thread! By the time my Son was 13, he'd been to several of my games and we had discussed him starting to officiate. The clincher for him was when he say me volunteer at the Special Olympics. On the way home he told me he wanted to do that.

Over the next year he read thru the rule book 5 times and took every rules test I could find. We would practice our mechanics in the mirror and we would discuss situations. I even gave him an oppurtunity to earn $5 if he could find a rule that I didn't know. This forced him to really dig into the rule and case book to find those qwirky rules and I certainly learned a few things as well.

The following year when I took my Special Olympic games, guess who my partner was? My Son is now going to turn 17 in 2 months and has roughly 500 games under his belt. He plan to get patched this year and I have 2 assignors who will schedule him Freshman games and possibly some JVG games.

I'd like to take him to some camps but don't want anyone to feel "short changed" for getting crewed up with a young fella. I'm so glad he's hooked and look forward to someday working a Friday night rival match with him on our crew. I'm only 41 so we could certainly reach this goal.