SURELY YOU JEST!!!
One of the neatest things about having a tennis officials blog is getting to see the varied (and sometimes vicious) responses of people to the blog and the posts therein.
Seems that some of our beloved officials now have a unique way or reacting when they are confronted with the blog or information on the blog--they say my blog and I simply DON'T EXIST... (Of course this comes from some of the more easily-offended officials at the women's pro tournament in Ft. Worth.)
Since I was greatly amused by this new tactic, I thought I would share a few of my random thoughts about my LACK OF EXISTENCE.
If my blog and I didn't exist then:
* Why do over 1,200 people visit our blog each week?
* Why do people in the USTA and Texas Section offices read it so faithfully?
* Why do people send me information when they want to get it out to everyone?
* Why did my two dogs just sit in my lap at my house here in Plano?
* Why did people call to tell me that my "existence" is now in question?
* Why do pro officials get their panties in a wad when they hear my name?
You see--my blog and I exist today for these reasons:
* To share information pertinent to tennis and tennis officials.
* To have a good time.
* To listen to officials' complaints and joys.
* To poke fun at things we seem to hold so near and dear.
* To confront those who can't seem to tell the truth.
* To expose injustices in the world of tennis officiating.
SURELY YOU JEST when you say that I don't exist. I'm alive and well and having a great time fellowshipping with some and offending others.
Have a good day and please note that I didn't say you don't exist. I know you're out there and hopefully will have more good blog posts about you in the days to come.
Note: They still haven't trained the chair officials in Ft. Worth how to put the game scores on the scoreboard...
18 comments:
Sue Pranke was telling us you didn't exist in this morning's officials meeting. By the way, while we were busting our butts working 20 minute shifts with 40 minute rest periods, she was sitting inside the TCU pro shop in the air conditioning watching the Olympics.
Wish I could say the same thing about my most unfavorite person from Texas
Hello,
Your blog exists for me and officials I work with.
Interesting content; issues needing some resolution, and commentary by the omniscienticos
about what you or others just don't get, but they have the ultimate insight,
like linespersonas, and the great
poobah, the chair umpire,
and evaluator moma.
they see all, know all and
assign all, evaluate all,
but who evaluates the evaluators?
Isn't Pranke the one who got fired as referee of the ITA national indoors at Brookhaven a feel years ago?
Wasn't Pranke the official who was fired from being referee at the ITA National Indoors at Brookhaven a few years ago?
She was and has also been banned from doing collegiate matches in Dallas. Guess the trend continues.
Isn't it funny that those officials who say you and your blog don't exist are the ones that always read what you post, as witnessed by the comments that Sue Pranke said in front of us fellow officials this morning at the Fort Worth Women's 10K.
I'm still laughing as I sit in front of my tv.
Randy since you do not exist, I reckon your blog is of a supernatural nature so keep it going. There are some of us that enjoy reading the news although there are some comments that are stupid,or just plain nasty.
All I can say to those officials is " if the shoe fits you will have to wear it"
Some days I do feel supernatural and some days I don't...
But thanks for the thoughts and compliment.
I heard she gave up working any college matches. Guess they are just too tough for her. You know most college venues require the umpires to keep up with electronic scoring and she has proven that is one ability she doesn't possess.
To repeat: for to support RM:::
this is a good forum to discuss ideas of interest to tennis officials
who take their supervision of tennis events seriously.!!!
RM posts a varied colection, and all can feed and prognasticate.
Hopefully elucidate, and avoid
bloviating
flatulence.
Probably the funniest part of this whole scoreboard fiasco was the Referee having to ask the spectators what the score was, especially during the tiebreaks in important matches.
I was working the event as an official member of the tournament director’s staff. On numerous occasions during the first three days of the tournament, I approached the Referee (Steve Reitman) and Chief Umpire (Sue Pranke) asking them to allow the chair officials to keep up with game points on the scoreboards, since quite a few of the spectators were approaching me wondering why points within the games were not being displayed. Mr. Reitman informed me it was his decision not to allow the chair umpires to display the score, his reasoning varying from his chair umpires weren’t familiar with the electronic scoring devices and didn’t know how to use the controllers, to the chair officials NEVER keep up with scoring and rely on scorekeepers to work the scoreboards, finally ending with he would rather have the chairs focusing on “calling code violations for racket abuse rather than pushing buttons on a scoring device.”
Being a certified tennis official with over 30 years of officiating experience, none of these reasons made any sense to me; not then and not now. The scoring controllers used at TCU are common across most, if not all, other tennis facilities which use score boards. Most new officials can gain a working knowledge in how to use the controllers in under 5 minutes of training. Each chair official assigned to work the Fort Worth 10K Futures Tournament was an ITF certified “badged” official, which should mean they have the necessary skills in dealing with scoring devices and observing what is transpiring around the court.
On day three of the tournament, I again approached Pranke asking her to reconsider her position. She was very terse in her response to me and simply stated “I have nothing more to say and I fully support his (Steve Reitman’s) decision.”
Am I wrong in my position in wanting the chair umpires to do what is normally expected from them and keep up with the game scoring? I would like to hear back from anyone with a differing opinion. Being a professional tennis tournament, I expect the chair umpires to BE professional and keep up with the score so the fans can get involved in the matches, and see how certain key points are being played, especially when there are four courts being playing concurrently.
Myron Krueger
Thanks for the perspective Myron. Very odd situation indeed. By the way do you have any idea how many code violations were actually called by the chair officials during the tournament? It would be interesting to know how much of their time that could have been spent keeping score for the benefit of players, spectators, and apparently the referee was actually spent calling the code violations the officials seem to be so concerned with. One other question, did the semi final and finals matches also take place without the spectators knowing what the scores were? At that stage in the tournament were there not officials available who could have acted strictly as scorekeepers thereby receiving valuable training in the use of somewhat standard scoring device? Also would appreciate your perspective on how ITA certified officials manage to keep score, make line judgments when requested, and still call code violations while at the same time dealing with collegiate coaches versus our friends on the pro side whose capabilities seem to be somewhat limited.
But, what would you expect with the USTA's focus on DIVERSITY??
This is what you get!!
As far as I know, there were no code violations but I did observe a couple of time violations for players taking over 45 seconds between points.
The chair umpires were constant throughout the tournament and never kept up with the points during games for any of the matches. To get around that decision, we tricked them by making them use a microphone for the finals. The chair turned it off midway through the first set in the dubs, but then used it for the entire singles finals. That really helped the spectators (and Referee) keep up with the score.
Interesting side note. The Chief Umpire was chairing a semifinals match on Saturday and had to call into the Referee to see if the heat rule (which was implemented as soon as the tournament got underway on Tuesday morning) was still in effect. The line officials sitting next to me all starting laughing.
It would be interesting to see some of the pro chair umpires work a Men's collegiate match where they have to be responsible for watching all the lines, knowing where each tennis ball is (on and off court), keeping score, controlling the players AND coaches, while keeping an eye on the rabid fans (and teammates) of opposing players and NOT making hand signals on close calls. I learned a long time ago that to be a good college official you must have excellent court sense and be able to multitask while still keeping an eye on what is transpiring, or about to transpire, on your court and surrounding areas.
Well Myron, you pretty well summed up what an ITA chair has to contend with. All things considered I'd say that you, the non-existent Mr. McDonald, Jim up in Oklahoma City and several other Texas-based ITA coordinators have done an outstanding job of training some darn good ITA chairs. So, if Pro chairs can't chew gum and keep score at the same time, what's all this "badge" stuff about?
One of the major criteria for being a "badge" person is AVAILAB ILITY.
A real person with a job, family doesn't have the time required to meet the requirements to maintain the badge once you get it. That's why a lot of badges are non-working spouses, or retired gov't types; now, aren't they the perfect protype.
And don't forget the ultimate criteria: DIVERSITY.
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