Press Box ejections

I'm just impressed they got a few dozen on-point comments in before it devolved into fighting about Trump.

 

On the PA mishaps, the best I saw was when I was covering an NCAA women's second round game on the local school's home floor. Game was not within reach by the visitors in the final few minutes but the coach kept calling timeouts and having her team foul. Really prolonged things. After yet another foul the PA guy yelled, "Come on!!!!" right into the live mic. He did not get kicked out but the look that coach gave him probably still haunts his dreams. He was on their bench side of the scorers table and she was right in his face just staring and not for a brief moment either. Didn't say a word though.

 

There was really no other place to sit. This gym was very small. The bleachers were maybe five or six rows high total on the one sideline. Other side had the team benches, and a couple of bleachers that were larger behind the benches.

Whenever someone had to inbounds on the sideline, the refs would make people move over, so the player could inbound the ball. If players were running near them, fans would pull their feet in. Maybe there was a foot or two of space between the bleacher and the sideline.

Had I stood behind the end line like I normally did at other bigger gyms, the refs would have run right into me, and I'd have been able to reach out and play defense, because there was only a couple of feet between the end line and the wall. Somehow, I never saw anyone crash into the walls, nor in the stands. The school's star player once did crash into the scorer's table chasing a loose ball, and during the final minute of a blowout win, but she was OK and laughed about it afterwards.

It was a really small school, that would graduate maybe 25-30 kids a year.

 

Seriously. How can you be a homer for a Class A minor-league baseball team?

 

I was shooting a basketball tournament a couple of weeks ago and got shooed off the baseline by an official. Apparently, in my state at least, it's supposed to be a point of emphasis this year to keep the baseline clear in the name of safety and the state's supervisor of officials happened to be at the game I was covering. The official was a veteran, so he wasn't obnoxious about it. Just told me to move to the corner and then explained why during a timeout.
Still, that was the first time any of them have ever told me that. And it rang hollow when, a couple of days later, I was practically forced into the corner anyway because there were 15 cheerleaders standing on the baseline with nary a word from the officials.

 

Let me guess. Langston Rogers?

 

Yep. The way he told me to get my ass in the press box was with a tone of, "If you don't, there are a lot of places around Oxford where we can bury a body."

 

I was on a plane flight once from New Mexico, leaving Albuquerque with the UConn basketball team. After eating a healthy portion of Hooters wings and baked beans the night before, I was fully loaded for the next morning. I stopped at a Dunkin Donuts and got a donut and some chocolate milk for the airport. I ate them and didn't think anything about it. But about 20-30 minutes later the baked beans went to work. I farted the entire time I made my way through the airport, stinking up every place I went. And they were horrible death-blow farts.

I thought I was pretty much done an hour or so later when we started boarding. But, as I boarded the plane with the Huskies, I felt an urge deep down in my bowels. So I held it as long as I could, then I planted it right in the middle of the section where all the basketball players were taking their seats. As I made my way to my actual seat many rows back, about 90 seconds later, I could hear them all yelling and screaming at each other.

I remember them blaming some poor kid, probably a student trainer. It was one of the most beautiful moments of mistaken identity in flatulent history.

 

That's awesome. This one time I took a shit on Jim Calhoun's mailbox

 

Used to cover a very rural school with an equally tiny (but immaculate) gym. They painted a dashed line just inside the out of bounds lines to mark where inbounders should stand. Otherwise they would have been throwing it in from the first row.

 

Graduated from a small high school in Iowa. Our gym's boundary lines left just enough room between them and the wall and bleachers for your feet. We had a restraining line on the court for inbound plays. The line was a couple feet inside the boundary line — the 3-point arc actually cut into it — and was only used on inbound plays. It was good for about five turnovers a game, especially inbound plays starting on the sides.

 

Mongo like donuts.