Dishonest Coach
 

Just thought I would get everyone's thoughts on this. I have been working basketball at the varsity level for about 20 years now and have never run across this situation.

BV game 1st quarter and coach is in my ear about a call. He is not animated but his tone is sarcastic and arrogant to say the least. I address his question in a professional way and he definately does not agree.

A couple more trips down the floor he addresses me again. At this point I try the nice guy approach and say politely I don't think I missed it, but you never know. No big deal. usually this approach gets the coach thinking this guy is pretty honest and calms them down. Nope...not this guy....he gets after me and says you did miss it. I address him a little more firmly and let him know we are going into not a very good place with his words.

Time out comes later in the quarter and my partner informs me that the coach said I addressed him and told him since he is yelling at me I will not call a fair game for him anymore. I never even came close to saying those words.

So, time out ends and approach the coach and say "I am going to say this as professionally as possible. My partner tells me you don't think I am going to call a fair game and this is what I told you"

He skirts the comment, and tries to make it sound like he was saying something else. I end the conversation with letting him know that anything else will not be tolerated.

Anyone else out there have a coach tell a partner a flat out lie about a conversation you had? How would you have handled this differently?

Thanks for the responses!

Yes, quite often. They even invent conversations that never took place.

Worse case though was a BV coach who I got into it with during a summer camp in an event not associated with any formal officiating organization.

He later told my HS commissioner that I didn't like him b/c he cut my son from his team. Nevermind that my son only attended his school as a freshman, never tried out for the basketball team, and didn't even have a GPA that would qualify him to play.

To the assignor: "That's not why I dislike him. I dislike him because he's a bald-faced liar!"

Do you think maybe the coach simply misunderstood your warning?

This is why the game of "telephone" doesn't work. It is all he said/she said going through a 3rd party. The message you get could be quite different.

My 2 cents...

1. Clearly you are not going to persuade the coach that you got the call right. Don't feel like you need to have closure. If I am 100% sure I got the play right, I would tell the coach, I had a great look and got the play right. If he continues then you can say "we will have to agree to disagree and move on." Once I get to that point, then further dialog on the play is unproductive. Obviously, if it was a tough play or you think you may have kicked it, don't tell the coach you got it right or that he is wrong.

2. I don't think how your partner handled the situation is an example of being a good partner. If a coach were to question the integrity of my partner... which he essentially did, he is DONE! Do not listen and if he does it again, the consequences will quickly escalate. The second teaching point is that I would have not relayed the information to you. Now you are upset even further. Your partner should have handled the situation and left you out of it.

The coach doesn't sound dishonest, he sounds like a grade A. jackass.

Around these parts, we are advised to keep enough distance between you and coaches so that anyone around you two can hear what's being said. After the time out, if you were going to address the coach, maybe you should have asked the partner who told you this to witness the conversation. Shameful that a coach would say something like that. My guess is, that attitude filters down to the players on the team.

My standard response when a coach tries to do this: "I will not discuss my parnter(s) with you" or something to that effect.

Really appreciate the feedback. My partner told the coach that he has been working with me for a long time and he would never say or do anything like that. When my partner told me what he had said I was upset and the situation needed dealt with. I take a lot of pride in knowing I am out there for the athletes and not the coaches. This did not affect how I officiate the game. But the coach did need to be called out on this and did need to know where he stood at this point. After our last conversation we did not have another problem with the coach. He was cordial and just coached his kids. Coaches are going to push as far as they can go until you do something about it. We have the pleasure of working with a lot of great coaches around our area. They coach, will ask questions when needed, and most of all are respectful to everyone. Every once in a while you have to deal with the other side.

Bingo. Always have a third person involved in these conversations. Not only can your partner confirm what the coach said right in front of him, this prevents the conversation from turning into a game of he said-she said.

I had an acquaintance of mine give a technical to the coach of one of the best teams in the state. The coach wanted to talk about it, so he invited my acquaintance (a few weeks after the game) to a talk in his office. Alone. Needless to say, some very negative things were said by the coach, but because they were alone, nothing can be done about it.

Always bring a third.

No way, no how would I ever do this.

I would certainly question the judgment of this official.

IMO this is giving way too much credence to the game the coach is trying to play. I'm not even entertaining this and depending on the situation may ask my partner(s) about it in the locker room. But I'm never having a conversation with a coach about what my partner said or bringing my partner over for that kind of convo. It's still a he said/he said only now you are doing it in person and the coach will just create another lie or add to the level of confusion.

And when would you possibly have time to do this? During timeouts or between quarters I may QUICKLY answer a reasonable question from a coach but I'm not having a conversation that lasts more than a few seconds.

Do you work for an assignor or do ADs schedule officials in your area? Either way this is just a horrid idea IMO.

+1. Not only would I never do it anyway but our assignor would absolutely have our heads if we did something like this.

See above.

Yep. That's what I was thinking through the entire OP. Once the coach starts going down that road, it's "coach, that's enough" then a T. The more we engage that type of nonsense, the more trouble we cause for ourselves.

If a coach wants to take a whole timeout to have a discussion with me, I am fine with that. As long as he remains respectful. How he uses his timeout is up to him; if he does not want to coach his team and make it better, but instead talk to me, that is his prerogative.

It varies greatly. Perhaps 40 percent assignor, 60 percent AD's. For the big schools, as in the case I mentioned above, the AD assigns for Varsity and uses an assignor for everything else.