Football Officiating > War Stories
Worst experience officiating
yarnnelg:
October 1998. Childs Park, St Petersburg, FL
3 in the afternoon.
South of the parking lot are projects. Drug deals galore.
Security? Armed off duty, St Petersburg Police Officers dressed in black fatigues.
Gun fight erupts in the projects.
400 hundred fans belly down in the dirt, off the stands. Two football teams belly down.
Five football Officials on the ground.
There is something sinister and serious about bullets whizzing by while in the dirt.
I was looking for a cleat divot to crawl into.
sirhoagy:
Detroit, 1995. Honestly don't recall the school.
Daytime game, varsity, high school. We played at 3:00 pm on Fridays because, you guessed it, night games in Detroit were NOT a good idea at that time.
The field was smack-dab against an alleyway. The end zone was, if you kicked/passed a ball over the heads of players, into the brick alleyway and it was not a good place to be. School was absolutely in the center of urban hell.
We did the game, five of us. I was R. Ball is kicked, through the uprights. Goes straight into the alley. Several large dudes are hanging around the end zone outside the fence. Wearing leather trenchcoats. In September. on a 80-plus degree day. One of them screams, "I'll get the ball, ref!" he does, tosses it back to us, but as he bent over to get it, we clearly - clearly - see a shotgun dangling out of his coat. This wasn't iffy; it was a damned shotgun.
The other dudes he was hanging with start to talk to him after he tosses the ball back to us and I can see him "adjusting" something under his coat.
Then the scoreboard goes blank. They can't get it restarted. My U says, "I HAVE A STOPWATCH RIGHT HERE COACHES! WE WILL KEEP TIME ON THE FIELD"
We got through the game really fast, no one complained. I asked my umpire..."Tim, you never have a stopwatch, how'd you know to have one today?"
He shows me his 'stopwatch.' Tim is a baseball umpire and he had a ball/strike indicator and that was what he used to 'time' the game.
We finished the entire varsity game in one hour and six minutes.
JasonTX:
Shotguns and Football games go hand in hand here in Texas. All the trucks that line up around the stadium along the fence all have a least 2 guns on the gun rack.
Sonofanump:
--- Quote from: sirhoagy on April 05, 2018, 02:37:19 PM ---Detroit, 1995. Honestly don't recall the school.
Daytime game, varsity, high school. We played at 3:00 pm on Fridays because, you guessed it, night games in Detroit were NOT a good idea at that time.
The field was smack-dab against an alleyway. The end zone was, if you kicked/passed a ball over the heads of players, into the brick alleyway and it was not a good place to be. School was absolutely in the center of urban HECK.
We did the game, five of us. I was R. Ball is kicked, through the uprights. Goes straight into the alley. Several large dudes are hanging around the end zone outside the fence. Wearing leather trenchcoats. In September. on a 80-plus degree day. One of them screams, "I'll get the ball, ref!" he does, tosses it back to us, but as he bent over to get it, we clearly - clearly - see a shotgun dangling out of his coat. This wasn't iffy; it was a darned shotgun.
The other dudes he was hanging with start to talk to him after he tosses the ball back to us and I can see him "adjusting" something under his coat.
Then the scoreboard goes blank. They can't get it restarted. My U says, "I HAVE A STOPWATCH RIGHT HERE COACHES! WE WILL KEEP TIME ON THE FIELD"
We got through the game really fast, no one complained. I asked my umpire..."Tim, you never have a stopwatch, how'd you know to have one today?"
He shows me his 'stopwatch.' Tim is a baseball umpire and he had a ball/strike indicator and that was what he used to 'time' the game.
We finished the entire varsity game in one hour and six minutes.
--- End quote ---
I was hoping your umpire was John from Sterling Hts, he had similar stories from Detroit HS.
ilyazhito:
--- Quote from: sirhoagy on April 05, 2018, 02:37:19 PM ---Detroit, 1995. Honestly don't recall the school.
Daytime game, varsity, high school. We played at 3:00 pm on Fridays because, you guessed it, night games in Detroit were NOT a good idea at that time.
The field was smack-dab against an alleyway. The end zone was, if you kicked/passed a ball over the heads of players, into the brick alleyway and it was not a good place to be. School was absolutely in the center of urban HECK.
We did the game, five of us. I was R. Ball is kicked, through the uprights. Goes straight into the alley. Several large dudes are hanging around the end zone outside the fence. Wearing leather trenchcoats. In September. on a 80-plus degree day. One of them screams, "I'll get the ball, ref!" he does, tosses it back to us, but as he bent over to get it, we clearly - clearly - see a shotgun dangling out of his coat. This wasn't iffy; it was a darned shotgun.
The other dudes he was hanging with start to talk to him after he tosses the ball back to us and I can see him "adjusting" something under his coat.
Then the scoreboard goes blank. They can't get it restarted. My U says, "I HAVE A STOPWATCH RIGHT HERE COACHES! WE WILL KEEP TIME ON THE FIELD"
We got through the game really fast, no one complained. I asked my umpire..."Tim, you never have a stopwatch, how'd you know to have one today?"
He shows me his 'stopwatch.' Tim is a baseball umpire and he had a ball/strike indicator and that was what he used to 'time' the game.
We finished the entire varsity game in one hour and six minutes.
--- End quote ---
How did he time the game on his indicator? I umpire baseball, and I know that my indicator goes up to 9 on the innings, but how would one record the seconds? By rotating the "ball" indicator every 15 seconds (Ball 1 = 15, Ball 2 = 30, Ball 3 = 45, Ball 4/0 = 60)?
Still, your crew had to have an understanding boss (or a lot of free time) and cojones to do that game. Props to you!
yarnnelg, gun fights at a youth game are not something for the faint of heart. Thank goodness you got out of that game in one piece!
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