Handled correctly ?
 

I was officiating boys MS basketball game with a new partner last week. The first game of the night went very well as did the second game until about 1 minute left. H1 goes up for layup and misses, V1 gets rebound. I start heading the other way and see that home team steals ball and goes up for layup, as I'm changing direction it "appears" that H1 gets hammered going up for layup. Partner (lead) doesn't have anything... Home coach is very upset (has been exemplary all game) and comes out on the floor and yells at partner "You have to call that or someone is going to get hurt ". Partner T's him up.....

I'm talking with the coach, trying to "cool things off" as FT's administered..... He says to me, " There's only a minute left and we are behind by 10 so the foul doesn't make any difference in the game , I get that,,,,, but he's gotta call something, my player really could have gotten hurt". I tell the coach that my partner had a really good look at the play and maybe from his view (coach's) it looked like a foul but I have trust my partner. Coach calmed down and was fine with my explanation.

As we are entering locker room, partner says "That coach is out of his mind if he thinks I was going to call that foul with 1 minute left. The player got fouled but he should have made the layup the first time". The comment took a few seconds for me to process......... as we are starting to get dressed he asked what I thought and I told him I call the game till the buzzer goes off and I would have called it if it was a foul. He didn't say anything else, grabbed his belongings and left without saying a word.

Did I handle it right ?? :confused: I have him a couple more times this year .

Thanks

You said what I would have said.

What Happens In The Locker Room Stays In The Locker Room ...
 

You handled it correctly on the court, i.e, not throwing your partner under the bus.

And, you handled it correctly in the locker room, i.e., giving your partner a tip on how to improve his game.

Two different places, two different approaches to handling the situation.

I won't pretend that games are called exactly the same at the end of blowouts as they are in the first minute.

And yet, I make sure we get every foul we need to get. Your partner needs to learn this.

tell your partner that HE was the problem, not the coach....

If HE called the foul like he was supposed to, the coach wouldn't have gotten the T!

There were two problems with the play. The partner and the coach.

The partner, as most will agree has to officiate the game to the end.

The coach has no business being on the floor. What if the partner was officiating the game to the end and just missed it? We've all had that once or twice in our careers, however that's not license for the coach to get stupid.

I have no problem with what you said to your partner. I probably would have said something to the coach about his behavior no matter how he liked or disliked the call. Two wrongs do not make it right. But what you said to your partner was very appropriate and probably the reason he needed to learn the situation to officiate. It was a MS game a probably someone that still is learning and has these philosophies that often do not fit our profession very well like not calling fous at the end of the game.

Peace

"Coach, whether we call a foul or not, it isn't going to prevent your player from getting hurt. "

I might be in the minority here, but I really think you need to stay away from "cooling off" the coach and saying you think he did not referee til the end. If you had been my partner we probably would have had a "discussion" about that.

If you want to disagree with the no-call, that's fine but you did not have the same look.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt that it was an obvious foul that needed to be called, then blow your whistle and call it.

If you are going to throw your partner under the bus, fix things with the coach, and then say that you thought he didn't finish the game, you are no better than your partner and are riding in the same boat.

You said it was a foul, then come in with a crew call, that way you only big time the guy once.

Great answer in my books.

Where exactly did he go wrong?

He deferred to his partner with the coach.

He told his partner, in the locker room, what he thought only after he asked. As for whether it was a foul, that information comes from the OP's partner, who said it was a foul and that he didn't call it because of the time and the fact that he felt the player shouldn't have missed the layup.

Go back and read the OP again because you must have misread the sequence of events. Nowhere did the OP throw his partner under the bus.

And the foul we need to get in this case is in favor of the team DOWN by 10....

Thanks to everyone for their responses..... I had hoped I'd handled it correctly .....

Thanks again.

There's so much wrong in here I don't know where to start... so I won't.

I think your response was spot on...on the floor and in the locker room.

As a matter of practice, I try to get together with my partner(s) near the end of a blowout and remind them to "get the felonies all the way to the buzzer".

While I also agree that games are not called the same the ending minutes of game with a clearer winner, you can't really pass on fouls.

Last year was my first year and I got the advice from a veteran to pass on all but the obvious fouls in the last 2 minutes of a game unless they were flagrant.

I had an obvious holding call right in front of me that I didn't call with about 1:20 to play, despite having called that same foul on the same player just a couple of minutes before.

Coach came unglued and told me to be consistent. I talked to my partner afterward and he told me that I was right in passing on it and the coach will get over it. That really didn't sit right with me.

A couple of games later I had the same team with nearly the same scenario and a different partner. I had another foul in front of me with about 45 seconds to play and I called it. When I went by the coach he told me he appreciated me calling that foul and right or wrong I called the entire game the same way and that's what his players need.

There's a lot to be said for consistency. However, there comes a point where everyone in the gym just wants the game to die (fans, coaches, players, and officials alike). Someone's winning 52-24, with a minute to go, you don't call that borderline shooting foul on the losing team that you probably did call in the first half when the score was 13-8. However, as stated above - call anything that's strong enough to get a reaction (i.e. the felonies).

Don't be that guy you're partner's going to talk about with his buddies later. "Dude called 7 fouls and 2 travels in the last minute of a 52-24 game. Took us 8 minutes to play that last minute when everyone on both sides just wanted to get on the bus."

No, I don't want to be that guy either. If I did that I'd be working the NBA.

Under a minute I'm just looking to get out of there myself. Unlike my partner last year who decided to call an intentional foul with the losing team down by 2 with 15 seconds to go leading to a 4 point swing in about 7 seconds.

So if you T a coach, you are ok with a partner going over to the coach to smooth things over?

Are you saying that if your partner "sees what appears to be an obvious foul (gets hammered)" that you passed/missed that it is ok for them not to call it either and later say that you did "not finish the game"?

Are you saying that if someone accused you of not ref'ing to the end when you thought you did what was right for the game that you would just let it slide? If I miss a call that needs to be made, I have no problem with a partner that makes a crew saving call. Maybe OP was in coast mode? The OP calls it a hammer (from his perspective, a long way) and then goes on to say he trusts his partner to the coach. If that is the case, two wrongs don't make it right. If I was the coach, I want to know why the OP didn't come in and make the call. Most coaches don't give a crap who calls it as long as it gets called.

If my partner says they aren't calling a foul, that's their business. If it is a foul that needs to be called, you can bet I will get it. I won't sit there and imply that my partner quit on the game. I would have told my partner that I think that was one that WE need to make sure we get and the coach probably had a right to be upset.

99% of problems that occur in a game are the result of not blowing the whistle enough.

This is a classic example....this end of game problem was caused by NOT blowing the whistle when it was clearly needed.

btw, if you feel strongly enough to tell your partner the he/she missed a call during the game, then you should have blown the whistle DURING the game. The only time a problem can be fixed is on the floor...NOT in the locker room.

I see no problem with telling the partner, in the locker room, what you think of him not calling a foul in this case. He is the one who said it was a foul, so saying the OP should have called it is not really the issue.

Wow... you put a lot of words in my mouth that I didn't say, and then ripped me for saying them. You must be a politician by trade. :)

You said: "I might be in the minority here, but I really think you need to stay away from "cooling off" the coach and saying you think he did not referee til the end. If you had been my partner we probably would have had a "discussion" about that.

If you want to disagree with the no-call, that's fine but you did not have the same look.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt that it was an obvious foul that needed to be called, then blow your whistle and call it.

If you are going to throw your partner under the bus, fix things with the coach, and then say that you thought he didn't finish the game, you are no better than your partner and are riding in the same boat.

You said it was a foul, then come in with a crew call, that way you only big time the guy once. "

I agree with your first paragraph. the rest, you're complaining about stuff that didn't happen in the OP and was never said. Did he say he wanted to throw his partner under the bus? No. Pretty much the rest of your post was a mess.

If it was a homicide I will come and get it. If it was something that just looked bad from where I was standing then I will ASK my partner about the play. If his response is "That coach is out of his mind if he thinks I was going to call that foul with 1 minute left. The player got fouled but he should have made the layup the first time. " then depending on the dynamics of our relationship I will respond with something showing that I don't necessarily agree.


However, nowhere in the OP do I see anything that indicates that the poster told his parther that he "missed a call".

I'm witnessing some really poor reading skills in this thread.

You are right there are games where everyone wants the game to end, but then do not put me in a position to call a foul. Some of that is on the teams, not the crew.

Peace

I disagree a million percent. You "fix" this problem by calling it out of your area on your own after partner passed, and you very likely CAUSE more problems than you fixed.

Heck, you might bring this up in the locker room and learn that your partner didn't pass on it because he wasn't finishing the game, but rather for something completely legitimate that YOU (from the non-calling area) could not or did not see.

I'm unsure where some believe I threw my partner under the bus,,, never have and never will. When the coach asked me about the play I said my partner was in a good position and had a good look at the play. Maybe from his view (the coach's) it may have looked like a foul but I gotta trust my partner.

I guess I should not have been discussing in depth so much with the coach but I've always tried to answer any questions they have (as long as they are questions).

I certainly did not comment on the play until my partner asked me (in the dressing room) what I thought ....... so I told him what I would have done. Just to clarify : My partner said that the player was fouled ---- in his words "pretty good" .

Again,

Thanks for the feedback

Reading Is Fundamental ...
 

I don't know how some posters missed this the first time. It certainly was very clear to me.

I had a very similar play last night in a MS girls game. V losing by about 15 with a minute or so left. V1 goes in for a layup and gets drilled.

I called the foul, and never even considered letting it go. Had I let it go, I probably would have had to T the coach.