I Think He Really Didn't Know
 

Yet another first. FB, white ahead by about 15-20 in the fourth quarter (that's late in the second half for those of you in St. Paul). Red shooting two.

White leaves a space open, and red brings a third player in to fill it. I send him out and coach protests. I tell him they can't have it, and before I can say why, he says, "not if they don't want it." "Coach, you can only have two in there."

"Whatever."

That was the first and last I heard from him.

"Whatever" is the new "F.U.," especially in the last decade or so.

If this is a hijack, say so and we'll move it somewhere else. On the subject of current "can't believe he didn't know that" as it relates to veteran officials: I have two from the same guy. 20 year veteran, more or less. Calling with him earlier this year, he called an intentional foul on a shot, counted the basket, cleared the lane, put the shooter on the line, and announced................. "One shot" :eek:

Last week, on his way to a game, he called me with a rules question: "What's the deal with point of interruption?" I told him to be more specific, then had to kinda pry the details of the question out. I finally told him, "Double foul in the post, give the ball back to the offense where the ball was, not near the spot of the foul. Does this answer your question?" He said that it did. I could sort of hear him as he passed this information along to whoever was on the other end of the argument/discussion. Apparently he hasn't quite mastered that hanging up the cell phone thing.

I think in this case, it was the new "bull sh1t." I don't think he believed me, but I also don't think he was about to challenge me directly. He's been stung by that bee once already this year. Whether he believed me, I don't care, but he chose more wisely this time.

You are too nice. I either ignore these type of coaches and don't bother trying to explain calls/rulings to them or simply let their players violate and then penalize them. It is far more effective.

I'm What You Call An Expert, I Have Two Daughters ...
 

This is not the whole story. "Whatever" is only properly used by female coaches, under the age of thirty-five, and they must roll their eyes while they are making this statement. Without the eye roll, the statement is meaningless.

Sounds like he was channeling a teenage daughter of his.

I wacked a youth coach last weekend for the whatever accompanied by the two handed overhand "get away from me" wave. He called me over to ask me a question, I got two words onto my answer and I got the whatever.

If you ask for my time I'm happy to to give it to you, but you'd better be respectful.

+4 (from each of the girls in my house)

Ah the dismissive wave, nothing will kill communications with a coach faster.

The two handed wave in that situation is likely going to bring a serving of tea at any level.

I had responded to his loud, "Don't push him out of there." I looked at him to make sure he was talking to me. He ran right through my warning last time I had him, but I had a feeling he needed to be addressed to prevent his frustration from boiling over. I'm willing to entertain the idea that I should have ignored him, though.