My first pre-game
Courtesy: USA Today
I hate shopping for clothes when I am the one who is supposed to be wearing the apparel. Nothing seems to fit. Well, nothing seems to fit properly. Not sure what happened to my body from the time I left high school till now, but there is more of me in certain places than I care to remember.
It isn’t totally my fault. I have several other people to hold responsible: Mrs. Butterworth, Aunt Jemima, Mrs. Fields, Tom Monahan (former Domino’s Pizza Dude), Little Caesar, Betty Crocker, Sara Lee, Duncan Hines, and of course, that temptress Little Debbie.
I was shopping for the typical referee clothes: plain black pants, black and white striped shirt and whistle. I ordered a ref shirt online and hoped for the best with regard to size. I also ordered a whistle, and my fingers were crossed on that purchase as well.
The problem appeared in that pair of pants; sort of. I hate ordering pants online because size does matter. I knew I’d blow out the seat of my britches if I ordered them too snug. If I went extra grande on my purchase, then I would have to raise my hand while whistling myself for a violation.
I decided to buy a pair locally and try the material on before plunking down the dough for my purchase. I visited several stores and could not find someone who sold “polyester-type” pants.
I flashed back to seventh grade, when many a department store mannequin could be found draped in polyester, but finding a vender now was darn near impossible.
One local sporting goods store came to my rescue, but with a hitch (literally). They had basketball ref pants, but they were a tad too large. And a “tad” in this case equaled the difference between accommodating one person and providing ample coverage for two.
A local seamstress removed two inches from the waist and shortened the inseam an inch and a half and I was good to go (or so I thought).
Trainer Gym Week 1
I tossed and turned the night before my first game. I woke up at 5:30 a.m. and could not get back to sleep. Images of court diagrams, situations, violations and fouls ran through my head and rest was totally out of the question. Instead of sheep I was counting three seconds.
Jim (my trainer) told me to meet him in the gym at 8:30 a.m. and we would go over things before our first game at 9 a.m. I complied and our pre-game prep talk was excellent! I was scheduled for two games and the players would be fourth and fifth graders.
I thought I could hang with the playas and that the speed of the game would allow me to whet my whistle and get in the flow. Not so. A woman (whom I had never met before) approached Jim during our meeting and informed him that her son would not be able to ref his two games that day because the lad had the flu. I would have told the namby-pamby to “get a bucket and a pair of Depends and get courtside.”
Jim turned to me and asked if I was up to calling four games instead of just two games. I said, “Sure.”
My feet took five steps away from Jim and the lady. My right arm raised (clenched fist mind you) and the hand that was attached slapped my lips.
“What were you thinking? All you will have to do is talk. Our feet have to do the heavy lifting and running.” Oops.
Courtesy: CBS Local New York
Jim introduced me to the coaches and informed them that I was not only a new ref, but this was also my first game to work.
Jim was only missing one more startling fact and he would have laid the perfect trifecta at both coaches’ feet. The looks were priceless. We shook hands and had one last pep talk. Before I knew it the ball was tossed in the air and I was off and running (jogging while huffing and puffing) in the right direction.
Five minutes into the game and my appreciation for belt loops had grown immensely, as the lower half of the polyester zoot suit that I was modeling was unencumbered by belt loops or any potential restraint. To make matters even more delicate in nature, the waist of the trousers was made of “s-t-r-e-t-c-h-y material, meaning my upper torso could be in the foul line extended of the front court while my rear end was still buried in the opponents’ backcourt.
I quickly found out that this was not an ideal position.
Courtesy: Bloomberg
Add in the fact that my ref shirt was made of some obscure NASA space-age material (slicker than snot) and would not stay tucked in, and you had a recipe for disaster. Actually, the recipe wasn’t for disaster. It was for a moon pie.
With my Fox whistle planted firmly in my cheeks, my right hand was hiking up the right side of my pants and my left was furiously attempting to tuck in the stripes. I chuckled and the whistle flopped out of my mouth (good thing it was choking my neck via a lanyard). Before long the game ended and I had achieved several milestones:
1. Called my first foul
2. Called my first violation
3. Hung on to my pants for dear life, thereby avoiding mooning the crowd
4. Pointed the teams in the correct direction of their baskets (which is funny because I attended one of my son’s college games and the officials had the teams going in the wrong direction for the first couple of minutes of the game. I wonder if they were beltloopless as well?
5. Did not make a fourth or fifth grader cry
Jim congratulated me on calling my first-ever basketball game. He really was helpful and supportive considering:
1. I had just crossed over to the “dark side” from coaching to reffing
2. Jim was one of the people responsible for calling several of my team’s games over the years
3. We had conversed during those games and the conversation was usually “Coach, sit down and let me call the game.”
The first game wasn’t too bad. At least I didn’t think I caused James Naismith any concern until I noticed the participants of the upcoming game. The first contest was between fourth and fifth graders. The second group of hoopsters consisted of third and fourth graders.
I was downsized before I knew it.
And once again an introduction was in order:
“Hi coaches, this is Kraig and he is a first-time official. Actually, that is not true. He just reffed his first game so you will be the second game in his career.”
I did notice that Jim did not mention the words “long and storied” in the intro. However, I received the same priceless looks from the two new coaches.
After game numero dos, Jim asked me if I knew where the men’s room was. I immediately felt bad for Jim because after spending all these years calling games in the building, no one had ever given him directions to “the little boys’ room?”
“No, I have no idea.”
“Okay, let me show you the way.”
We walked through the bigger gym next door that contained bigger players.
I immediately broke one of the Ten Commandments. Envy.
Oh, how I immediately longed for the day when I could officiate a game involving players who shaved (face or underarms did not matter).
Jim gave me the low down on concessions and what we received for calling two or four games. Forget the walking tacos, I would just settle for an on-site seamstress.
Games three and four were a blur. I called a foul and thought I performed everything in a correct manner. At the next timeout I asked Jim if I raised my clinched fist to signal a foul and before I could even get half of the sentence out of my lips, he smiled and said: “No, you never raised your hand.” I thought of telling Jim, “Well, I raised it at 5:30 this morning.”
All through the day, Jim asked about my welfare: feet, legs, breathing and hydration. I cannot believe he never, ever once thought to ask about my pants.
