It’s tough to imagine what what it’d be like having someone taunting me while I wrote. I can’t tell you how I’d handle writing a story with some guy screaming over my shoulder, “Hey Paperboy, your medium is dying!” “Nice lede, schmuck. My six-year-old writes better!” “You’ve got your theres and theirs mixed up, genius!”

I know. I missed my calling as a heckler.

I might work in the middle of music blaring, through fans screaming or jeering and a million different things happening at once in the games I’m covering, but it’s always been a comfort to me that I do so in obscurity. Everyone’s watching the game, right? The focus is off of me.

The referees live life on the other side of that coin. Every call they make is judged. If the fans agree with the call, it might receive nothing more than a head nod in the midst of a conversation. If they disagree, look out.

“You get used to it,” Edmonton lead official Jake Steinbrenner told me during halftime of Sunday night’s Energy game.

"The tough, controversial, end of game calls, that’s when people pay attention, that’s what everyone remembers.

“It’s something that we obviously train for. But I don’t think it’s a good thing that we continually allow people to rant at the officials so they can embarrass or ridicule us, because then everything becomes like pro wrestling grandstanding, or UFC bloodlust. We don’t need that in any sport. Venting emotions and gamesmanship though are fine and can sometimes add to the excitement and fun."

If you watch basketball in Edmonton, you’ve seen Steinbrenner in action before. The referee assignor for Energy games, the Alberta Basketball Officials Association Evaluation Chair and an IBL, CIS and Edmonton official, he’s been around the local hoops scene at every competitive level of the game and a few not-so-competitive levels, too.

He emailed me last week, with some criticisms of a previous blog post that talked about the Edmonton IBL officials. In the email, he laid out the refs’ responsibilities on the court in these games.

“Our role is to apply the rules consistently in their spirit and intent so that the integrity of the game is upheld. This means ensuring it is fair and impartial for both teams without influence from criticism from coaches, players or fans. Also, to keep the game safe for the players and to maintain a "family friendly" atmosphere for the IBL product, as mandated by the IBL’s owner Mikal Duilio. We also try to maintain the excitement and entertainment inherent in the pro game, which calls for different rule applications than in amateur contests.”

Duilio, who was cc’d on the email, chimed in shortly after with what was some surprising info, to me at least. 

“I have sent 4 to 6 memos over the last two seasons describing the Edmonton referees as the standard for the way they call the game; instead of ignoring sportsmanship problems, the Edmonton referees deal with sportsmanship issues with robotic, professional warnings and technical fouls- they way it should be done… I have sent at least 4 memos, at least… one went out about a week ago...”

And from that most recent memo:

“Edmonton is one of the few areas where they call the technical fouls correctly---robotically--- if a team does X, the referees penalize with Y (no emotion, no caring, just warnings and technicals)… Edmonton referees issue technicals when they are there, they do not ignore or ‘rise above’ because they care about keeping sportsmanship rules in place at all times and that is actually how it should be done everywhere… all of our referees are being asked to call the technical fouls as outlined in every rule book and in our rule book as well...”

Like I said in my previous post about the refs, I know that the Bellingham coaching staff was more than pleased with the jobs the refs did over their weekend in Edmonton at the beginning of May, and that Steinbrenner had good feedback from Tacoma coach Mark Lovelady prior to Sunday’s game. And while it’s true that I’ve heard harsh criticisms of the refs from both benches this season at MacEwan gym, those criticisms have come in the heat of the moment or immediately after a game. Duilio pointed this out to me in his email and even threw in a story of Edmonton refs T’ing him up when he was in town last year with his Oregon team:

“My team came up from Oregon last year and we got 3 technical fouls and all 3 were easily deserved… I wanted to win badly and not only did I agree with the 3 technical fouls but as a 15 year officiating veteran, I loved their calls as well, even though we did not win either game.”

Pre-game this past weekend, Paul Sir was appreciative for the most part of the work the Edmonton officials had done this year. It seems like whenever you talk with basketball folk before a game, you get a more neutral feeling on their impressions of the ref’s overall work.

From the time I started covering the Chill last year, I wondered if there were transitional issues for the refs going from calling CIS games to the IBL. Steinbrenner told me that’s not where the job gets hard.

“I don’t think it’s all that tough,” he said. “It might be tougher during the regular season. To do a CIS game, then Monday night a Division 6 men’s league game or a junior varsity high school game, that’s what’s tough.

“At least (from CIS to IBL) you’re comparing elite athletes. We let way more contact go here in the IBL because the key is to get to this (offensive) end of the court, where the fans want to see scoring. We don’t have to worry about calling fouls that we’d normally call at CIS. There and at developmental levels it’s about teaching fundamental skills and things like that. Here, we expect everyone to have those skills.”