Denim Millward
Sports Editor
At the risk of reaffirming my old and curmudgeonly persona, I will say that I have been attending sporting events at every level of competition for approximately 25 years, which is probably longer than many of you have been alive.
From little league to professional competition, or church basketball to collegiate athletics, each event had one common factor.
Despite the disparate skill levels of the contestants involved and the enormous difference in the stakes of each game, there were multiple instances of verbal abuse of the referee or official in charge.
Hidden somewhere between the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat, as accepted and unremarkable as a pre-game barbecue or a post-game beer at the local bar du jour, the relentless, merciless and usually personal ridicule and accosting of sports officials is unquestionably one of the ugliest and most unsavory parts of athletic competition.
Don’t get me wrong: I don’t see myself as a perfectly well-mannered attendee of athletic competition hoping to educate the rest of you ref-taunting heathens a little civility and common decency. I was a moderately bad offender for numerous years myself; blowing my top when a call didn’t go my team’s way, letting the closest official have it, peppering in a few choice words when I felt especially brave or was certain that no authority figures were within earshot.
Recently, I was doing some freelance work covering a girls’ high school basketball game.
The game was somewhat close the entire way, and though the majority of the game ticked by without any incidents, one particular foul call incited the home crowd, who hurled a litany of insults the way of the offending official, who did his best to pretend not to hear.
“How was THAT a foul, you dope?”
“What game are you watching, zebra?”
“Pull your head out and call the damn game!”
I heard each one of these phrases and wrote them down in my notebook immediately.
I had been wanting to write this article for some time now, and felt it important to include a few choice phrases that were hurled at the official verbatim. Even at an early-season, out-of-conference girls’ high school basketball game, the reward a referee gets for making what he feels is the correct call (and for the record, I thought it was close, and was definitely not an egregious oversight,) is the honor of being called a “dope,” “zebra” and to be told to “pull your head out.”
In the heat of the moment, none of these insults seemed terribly bad, especially compared to the profanity-laced vitriol I’ve heard aimed at referees in the past.
The moment that changed was when I was waiting to interview the winning coach and caught a glimpse of the offending official walking to his car with his son, who couldn’t have been much older than 9 or 10, in tow.
Neither the official nor his son looked much worse for wear after weathering the storm of harsh words, but they didn’t look like they were ready to go dance a jig either.
Seeing the father and son walk out to their car, to drive to their house, to live the rest of their probably-normal lives made the ad hominem attacks directed toward the official echoing around in my head bother me exponentially more.
Is there any other job that is as thankless, pays as little and involves getting unceasingly destroyed for doing your job to the best of your ability as being a referee? Certainly not that I can think of.
With officials, we make the same mistake we do with athletes, dehumanizing them by thinking of them simply mechanical aspects of the game that sometimes commit the egregious sin of calling a foul or a penalty against our favorite team. We don’t stop to think these are men and women with families, friends, careers outside of refereeing, and most importantly, feelings.
The phenomenon is the same with pro athletes, who we alternatingly think of his demi-gods capable of superhuman feats or worthless commodities that have grossly underperformed for what they’re being paid and should be jettisoned from the team tout de suite.
The difference is this: at least athletes have fame and fortune to console them.
Referees only have the knowledge that they’ll more than likely relive the abuse in a few days and be meagerly compensated for it.
Idaho State University fans have not been unusually offensive compared to other crowds I have seen, nor have they been especially well-behaved.
Verbal abuse of officials is no more or less prevalent here than elsewhere, in my opinion.
That’s not to say, however, that there isn’t a huge amount of room to improve.
While quoting this band may seem oddly-placed in an opinion piece calling for better treatment of sports referees, as Rage Against the Machine once said, “It has to start somewhere/it has to start some time/What better place than here? What better time than now?”
What if Idaho State were nationally renowned for their exceptional treatment of referees?
It seems a far-fetched pipe dream at best, but consider the residual effects were this the case.
An avalanche of positive publicity for ISU would ensue. It would also help build a tangible national identity for Idaho State, and while implementing this strict code of conduct should only be done in the name of common decency, it couldn’t hurt our on-court and on-field performances, could it?
The change can’t happen overnight, but has to begin at an individual level.
So the next time a whistle is blown and a call goes against ISU, keep your comments about the poor officiating to yourself and instead save your breath for cheering for our beloved Bengals.
