Awful Partner
 

How do you guys handle it (at the game) when you end up working with a partner that is beyond awful?

This has never happened before (good association) but just had two consecutive nights with 1st/2nd years that seemed to have no knowledge of mechanics, rules, and court positioning.

Night 1: partner with white socks, dirty shoes, black work pants with belt loops and no belt. Positioned 3 feet on the court in L position, in the way of the players, etc. Train wrecks throughout his primary. Ouch.

Night 2: first pregame question - "what is a 1-on-1, and when do we call it?". (Uh, oh, we're in trouble). Multiple calls (weak whistle) with no indication of the violation or foul. Blows his whistle and looks at me. Coach yelling "what's the call?". I go over - "you have to call something, what did you see?". Other examples: 5 seconds CG in backcourt. 3 seconds nowhere near the paint, etc. Two or three times I had to announce "inadvertent whistle". Crowd enjoying the show...some laughing.

In both cases, the coaches and crowd starting going nuts. I tried to be very decisive and professional just to over compensate. I notified the assigner afterwards in both situations, but how do you best handle this during the actual game? Do you just call everything, everywhere, just to survive? What should/can you say to the coach?

Get In, Get Done, Get Out.

Do the best you can, and call your assigner afterwards if it's really bad.

give them one thing to work on. If it's that obvious to everyone, talk to the coaches and tell them to back off. Be polite, but you're not really asking; you're instructing them to back off.

As a new official, this kinda cheers me up. I need a ton of work on learning how to watch multiple things at once and how to discern what should be called and what shouldn't, but I'm not THAT bad.

Night 1: I have come across a few officials that have dressed as you discribed, they have surprisingly turn out to officiate a he!! of a game. Secondly, how do you know that these train wrecks, although in his primary, aren't your responsiblity because he was on ball?

Night 2: I doubt if I would say anything to the coach, they probably already know.

yeah, they know, but I'm sure as hell not going to let them spend the game whining and working the rookie. He needs to be able to work the game, and I'm doing what I can to make sure he doesn't get run over by some middle school coach.

+1

Did you take the opportunity to talk to them after the game was over?? Some guys are looking for input.

This being my fourth year, I always dont mind a little criticism, I have also worked with guys that needed a little talking to as well and I dont mind sharing my limited knowledge.

I'd notify my assignor about the unprofessional appearance, but depending on the level worked, your assignor might need the warm body. As far as positioning goes, talk to the partner during timeouts and bring this up. Train wrecks in his primary, go ahead and expand your coverage and get the big ones.

Correct the real big mistakes, talk to your partner on little things to work on during timeouts and halftime, and be supportive especially if your partner seems to want to learn. You'll also have to handle the coaches. I'm not going to let the coach to be continuously whining all game.

I've not been in this type of situation in a long time, but in a 2-person game if we have a train wreck that requires a foul, I'd give my partner a second to get it and if he doesn't, I'm getting it. I won't call through 6 bodies if I have to guess if there's a foul, but I'm not going to let a partner sink our ship, either.

Great advice, in general.

I hope he did. From his OP, it sounds like he just needed help for himself. Every once in a while we have a drive by poster who likes to complain about his partner, who was just awful. Never do they mention the outreach they provided after the game.

Absolutely, most of us are OK with constructive criticism. We also had:
Pre-game prep.
Halftime corrections (survival mode).
Post game discussion.

Tried to be respectful and helpful. Suggested a couple things that they can work on. IMO you can control how you are dressed (no excuse for that). The second guy was flustered and defensive, even though I was very diplomatic. I also think there is no excuse for not knowing the very basic rules such as bonus/double-bonus foul rules (my wife knows this stuff).

Good deal.

Help him out. Time outs or dead balls, when appropriate, give him some direction without being obvious. Half time review 3-4 key things you see rather than dump a system overload on him. Sounds like it's trial by fire and not qualified yet for this level. A low level PD game would be a starting place. Red flag though is white sox, goofy pants and not knowing a 1 and 1. Sounds like a non basketball guy looking for a paycheck

We were all there our first game, hopefully he will be receptive to constructive critiquing.