Coaches Hiring Officials

[MD Longhorn]

When I used to work football in Dallas, I had the coach's opinions of me front of mind - I used to worry endlessly when I pissed off the wrong guy. That's because in football, in Dallas, coaches run everything. Plus - there were hundreds of officials, all begging for work. Good luck getting work if you aren't gladhanding the right people.

Now, in the sports I work (in Houston now), I don't even give it a second thought. I don't mean to say I'm intentionally callous or irritating to coaches... just that the prospect of them not scheduling me (in the case of the OP) or telling schedulers not to is not even on my radar. Should it occur that some coach insists on scheduling umpires his own tourneys, he'll get the dregs - real officials won't work that way here, and should you happen to piss off one guy, there's plenty of work around if you're a good official