Newspaper Article
 

Officials mar game - DailyPress.net | News, Sports, Jobs, Escanaba Information | The Daily Press

This was an article that was printed in a local newspaper. The article was printed for the sole reason to trash officials. The two officials working the game have 80 years of experience between the two of them, and one of them has been doing college games for the past 20 years. They are some of the most respected officials in the area.

Any of you guys ever seen something like this printed in newspaper?

Absolutely not. That article is implorable, and I can't believe the editor allowed it. Yellow journalism at its best. :mad:

Guy's an idiot. The woods are full of them. Unfortunately, some are given a forum where their stupidity is shared with the masses. Such is the case here.

Before we get all caught up, allow me to ask this question...

What if the writer is telling the truth?

I know both officials personally and have worked with both, this is nothing like anything they would ever do. One of the officials in the story I talked to the day this was printed and he said neither of them ever didn't run all the way down the court for a play, or ever send players to the line where there wasn't a reason to shoot free throws. As far as the free throw difference, as we all know stats don't tell the real story of the game. Out of the 20 whatever free throws shot by the one team, at least 10 of them were in the end of the game when they were intentionally fouling to get the ball back.

While I'm guessing STONGE in the comments below the article is a brother official, he didn't do the crew any favors by all but identifying one of the officials and stumbling through a barely coherent rant littered with grammar errors that will only serve to inflame a public just looking for another reason to be disgusted with officials.

That said, I find it hard to believe, especially from a sports writer who is wearing a "Jersey Shore"-style chain in his headshot for the site. I guess the refs aren't the only ones with poor judgment and lagging professionalism.

I cannot take anyone seriously that says "3 steps were taken...." to describe a traveling. It would have been worse if he said "2 and a half steps."

And I certainly do not take him seriously when a great deal of the evidence he gives are shooting numbers from the FT line. No mention of 3 point shots or other aspects of the actual game as well.

I do not think people on those sites with an article take the conversations that seriously. And if they do I would not really lose sleep over what they think. I doubt a comments in the article are going to make that big of a difference and I doubt seriously many people are bright enought to figure out if the person commenting is an official either.

Peace

All the News That's Fit to Print?
 

Responses and reactions like that are popular around here in the online media where anonymity protects the writer and the "fanboy" perspective reigns supreme, and I gotta admit, they're often a real hoot to read. Never saw anything like that in print that I can recall.
Another reason why having video of officials shot by officials is a neat thing. Association or assigner sends video to the state for their review and they can make their own assessment in comparison to the inflammatory article. And if video validates there's a crew that should be sent out to pasture . . . well . . .

Based on what he wrote, apparently the moronic newspaper writer (who is also the sports editor!) doesn't know that in HS ball, a team can be in the bonus in the first half. He should be writing for some tabloid you find at the checkout counter.

Oh yeah - he says he's been covering basketball for three years. Three whole years! I guess that makes him an expert. :p

Meanwhile, this thread has probably doubled his lifetime readership.

Thanks for being fan of high school basketball.

Seemed more like a column than a game story, but I agree, his comments seem totally out of line.

I saw something like that in a local paper near my new hometown. I think there's a reason small town journalists never rise above that level.

Interesting that the initiator of this thread also chose to become involved in the post-article comments. I've seen plenty of online trashing of officials, sometimes of my crew. But I've never chosen to become involved in the subsequent circus of commentary. With solid evidence (opposite of "opinion") to the contrary of the writer's opinion (opposite of "evidence"), I've been tempted, but always allowed their low-information ignorance to run rampant without my trying to straighten it all out.
I think I'm gonna continue that policy for myself.
Doesn't seem worth it, in the long run. Do you?

Morons like the commenters show up at every basketball game I work. Without any video, there's no way of knowing what kind of job these guys did. 80 years of experience means nothing to me -- it could be that maybe these guys can't keep up anymore. Maybe not.

(Last night I had a lady in the corner who had this grating voice and all she did was whine and complain about "fouls" we weren't calling and other things that showed her complete lack of basketball intelligence. I told my partner that if she was my wife, I'd probably mix myself a rat poison cocktail.)

That said, I can't believe how unprofessional it is for a writer for a paper to spend this much time writing a hack piece on the officials, no matter their quality. Someone needs a huge dose of perspective. I drove home last night, over 100 miles, on snow covered roads. It took me over 3 hours to get home. I have a check in hand for $115 (including $50 mileage money). Anyone who thinks we're doing this for the money (especially those of us who travel long distances to work varsity games) is a complete fool.

We have a guy here locally who does a pretty good job in the newspaper, but the other night wrote a series of tweets while covering a game that really hammered the officiating crew. To be fair, I looked up who was on the game and I'm sure some of what he wrote was the truth -- however, what good does it do for guys like this (and the writer of this article) to write crap like this?

Anyhow, as more media finds its way onto the web, I guess we're going to continue to see the BleacherReport-ization of sports reporting, where anyone who has the time and inclination to write complete crap that gets page views will continue to do so.

Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. If it doesn't work for you, then don't post. That doesn't mean everyone should follow your example.

+1-1/2

Plumber. ;)

Sometimes an idiot, even in print, needs to be called out.

"Did you call for that?" "Yes". "OK, then. That's not uncalled-for."
 

-1-1/4
;)
+7/8
:)

We usually get at least 1 article complaining about the referees every year in our local newspaper. When I get home this evening I will hurt the last 1 that was written. It wasn't too bad but last year there was a skaving article.

This was a recent one, It's from one of the local writers

It goes on if you want to read it. From what I have heard, the "T"s were very justified, profanity was used in all 3.

This was from a couple of years ago

From the text above
 

Shouldn’t it be mandatory to be a previous coach or player?

Sure - and it should be mandatory to be a passenger or a flight attendant prior to becoming an airline pilot. :rolleyes:

I just had the pleasure of reading a story about the MS girls team where I work. It included a line about a rumor that the girls' team had not scored a FG all year. (Not true). THEN, the "reporter" included a 'moral victory' line when the girls scored their first two FGs of the year. How hard is it to ask the coach about such a rumor? Some reporters do a great job, but others are way below coaches on the intelligence scale.

Funny you happen to say that... this game the two of them went 100 ONE WAY and when got there they were handed a check for 60 dollars (50 for the game and 10 for mileage) what a joke!!!!

I didn't post anything in the post comments...

You Seen One Yooper, You Seen Them All
 

Nice.

I guess "YooperBill" and "yooperbballref" are not the same.

Sure are a lot of guys calling themselves "Yooper Something-or-Other" up there! :D

Confusing to us "Trolls", I guess. :o

Yooper and proud of it :D

gold

this isn't "yellow journalism"...this is simply a poorly-written column by a writer expressing his opinion of what he saw. he may be right or he may be wrong - since none of us were there, we cannot form an accurate judgement as to the validity of his column.

it certainly will strike most people that this level of criticism of high school officials is exceedingly rare and in poor taste. there is a reason that this type of public criticism is very unique....most people view it as unacceptable.

Unless you're in the stands. There it's become the rule, not the exception.

Sometimes there is another side of the coin. Quite a few years ago now, an article appeared in the local paper here. It was about an official calling it quits after a long career and, as I recall, was very sympathetic to his perspective. The notable quote from him was something like:

"Now the main objective of the game seems to be beating an opponent in any way you can, as badly as you can, and then to get in his face afterward. I've had enough."

I can relate.

Da Yoopers - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This should explain why they are all Yoopers up there, hey. :)

I can agree with that attitude of the participants, but I certanly do not officiate for the players or the coaches. I officiate because I love the game and love the competitiveness I have to do my best and to be the best I can be.

And it just makes me laugh how ignorant fans are about these things and certainly media people.

Peace

I have never officiated for any other reason than I enjoy it. Yes I played, yes I also coached but I don't do it for the kids and I don't care either way for them. I just enjoy the challenges of officiating. Especially the one where I have to be impartial to all parties at all times and above all else.

Officiating for any other reason is just not a good way to approach this hobby/avocation/profession/career IMO.

Not all are like the one in the OP, of course. After a tightly fought rivalry game, I saw the local sports editor in the parking lot. He commented on how well the game was called with all of the tension, etc. I then explained to him what had occurred on one particular play, which was a technical foul for a DOG violation after a warning. He took out his notepad and wrote it down and used that reference in his writeup. He learned something, he was appreciative, he kept it anonymous, and he appeared to be a writer who knew a lot about the game to his readers. It was a play that only about 3 knew about with any certainty. It all boiled down to mutual respect...something that is in short supply.

I have seen many writers that are very responsible and very professional. And it was not very professional to write what he did without some game information that would have backed up even the slightest claim that the officials made mistakes. Even if he was right in some of his observations, it is not very good reporting not to back that up with some numbers or information that says something appeared to be wrong.

I will never forget an article that was written about a playoff game where the coach of the winning team accused the IHSA of basically setting up his team by the location of the game and the officials that were assigned. To make a long story short, the reporter properly quoted the coach but at the end showed the number of FTs shot and missed by this team. I thought it was brilliant because there was no brow beating about what happen in the game or the role of the officials in that game. It was a brilliant article.

Peace

Problem here is you've got what appears to be a news piece that is an unsubstantiated rant. The only commentary/ issues are anecdotal. I saw this, I saw that. Free throw dispcrepancy is not an indicator. Though the idea that one team is in zone committing more fouls then a team clutching and grabbing all over the floor seems like there might be something more there then we are hearing about from the coach.

Bottom line unless someone has video evidence of missed calls/ blown calls (not subjective foul calls) on the OOB or travels this is just incendiary for no other reason then to evoke response. MOving on.