Grew up in a small town outside of Utah. Attended a small Ward with average SM attendance of 50-60. Never gave much thought to whether the church was true of not. My mom said it was, but dad never said it wasn't. Went on a mission and attended Rick's College and BYU. Moved so So. Cal. and was involved in a SYA ward. Moved back to a small city in the southwest with a couple of wards. I attended off and on.

I was a high school basketball referee. Our stake had a basketball season. Someone found out I was a referee and asked me if I would referee one of the games. The other referee had refereed a few other church games and did ok.

I was refereeing a game with a member of the High Counsel on the team. I called a foul on him and he said "that's a bunch of crap." I gave him a technical foul to which he responded "now you are just being stupid." I gave him another technical and told him he was now disqualified from playing further. He said I couldn't do that to him because he was on the High Counsel and I was only and Elder. I turned around and walked out of the building. The next week I was called again and asked if I would referee the next game. I said "Sure" but never showed up. I have not been back to church since.

I guess I was just offended.

If you could have a do-over, instead of walking out would you have simply called the game a forfeit against the HC's team, on the spot? His pinhead might have exploded over that.

As a fellow referee good job...in my 38th year of officiating but never, ever will I do church basketball. Any church league, not just LDS. In fact, most of my fellow officials here in Georgia will agree with me that so called " Christian " schools are the biggest problem...

Gatorman
9-4
20-5

I have close to 38 years as a referee.

My career started when a local youth league at the YMCA was short handed and asked my friend and I - we were shooting hoops- if we were up to the job.

Around the end of the first quarter the coaches had a short meeting and fired us on the spot.

No callbacks since, but you know my answer if it's a Mormon/Christian league.

Are we neighbors? I'm in CSRA. Just asking.

Cludgie
Lived in the CSRA 35 years before retiring and moving to North Georgia. Was in the Augusta Ward by assignment before I left....
Bulk of officiating career there....

Gatorman
9-4
20-5

I have too many technical fouls to even consider joining a church team for sports; although, truth be told, I've heard members of the clergy drop a few around me. I guess I'm a safe space for cussers.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2017 12:15AM by BYU Boner.

It kind of pissed me off at the explorers level. I was into boy scouts, and I liked camping and hiking. One day our bishop decided that every boy who was fourteen or older had to quit scouting and join the "explorers." The explorers did nothing but play basketball. That's all they did. I didn't like basketball, and I had no options. It was just another thing that drove me out. I already knew the book of Mormon was a pile.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2017 12:15AM by donbagley.

Perhaps being British has something to do with this, but I could never quite work out why the Church had such a seeming obsession with basketball.

They stuck up a hoop in every 'cultural hall' in every UK chapel they built. Why?

(and what's so very 'cultural' about basketall anyway?)

It seemed almost a Mormon obsession.

"Why?"

Cultural Imperialism.

The British don't have any culture. Neither does Europe, Latin America, Africa, Asia, or Polynesia.

Its impossible be to acknowledge culture when one is imposing one's culture, including religion, on someone else.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2017 12:34AM by BYU Boner.

I was well on my way out of THE church by the time this happened so it was not the reason that I left, but it certainly did NOTHING to encourage me to stay.

One of my last callings was "facilities ....person?" I can not even remember the exact title but it was basically the guy who has keys to the building and who is supposed to shovel the sidewalks in the winter and see that the folding chairs that they are so desperately trying to wear out are put up. so I get a call telling me that I am supposed to go lock up the ward house because the priestDUD is down there playing Basket ball and after 10 PM which is time for them to leave and go home. By the time I get there It is 10:30. SO I walk in. Politely inform the guys that it is pretty much time to wrap things up and head home, just as I have been instructed. I get told by several people that they do not want to leave and that they are not going to leave and that they can be there as late as they want to be. I tried explain that I like sports but that I had the responsibility of locking the building and that I did not want to be there a lot longer. they made it known to me that they were not going to leave until they damn well felt like it.
Being the total @$$ hole that I am, I tried to bargain with them: can we wrap it up at 11 pm, dudes ?? They just kept on playing, so I tried to entertain myself by watching. a few minutes later one guy kneed another guy right in the crotch. The victim had been playing tight defense but he was NOT fouling or using undue physical contact. The victim had been blindsided. The guy who did it thought it was really funny. that kind of crap really irritates me. I wanted to go out on the court and punch the offender in the face over it. Then I thought, is that what that guy intends to do to me IF I get insistent about closing this place down because it is after 11 PM? THe way that I was supposed to close it down ....half an hour ago. Then I thought, If that guy does try to crotch kick me, I am going show him one of my favorite tricks which is throat punch the assailant, then grab the opponent by the hair and try to bash a hole in the wall with their skull. Then I thought: WHY am I subjecting myself to this CRAP??? Why?

I walked out of the cultural hall basket ball court. I locked the doors and Then I left. I don't know what time the BB players left the church building. I did not care. I was going to turn in my building keys at the very next chance that present itself. That Sentiment must have made it back through the priestDUD channels somehow without my even saying so, because they asked for my keys Before I could say that I did not want to have them any more. That was the end of that calling !!!!

I noticed this, as well. Every RS newsletter I get has a weekly note about women's basketball at the stake center

My little brother who was a high school all-star basketball player and also an all-star baseball player was barred from playing any church sports because his baseball team played Sunday games....and the local church sports coordinator being a self righteous asshole probably didn't help either.

I never attended any church ball games, but do remember hearing stories from yester year about how the 'sainted' ones in Stirling, Raymond, Magrath, and Cardston - all goodly temple attending brethren and 'sistren' would curse, cuss, and abuse their fellow saints, players, and coaches from the rival towns. LOL! Of course the next day, Sunday, they were all piously sitting in their pews, swallowing that sacred sacrament; heads bowed in false humble righteousness in the name of their LARD! I prefer Tenderflake myself, but I digress.

Thing is, my dad was a well respected temple attending HP and my brother was playing baseball at a high level (American Legion equivalent or better) which involved Sunday games...and the asshole barred him because he could. Fucking cult.

I watched by brother play for the LCI Rams against the Comets in the Raymond Sugar Bowl basketball tournament. It was quite a zoo...especially all the Mormon fathers behind the Raymond bench yelling orders at the Comet's coach.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2017 10:18PM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

I never EVER in my life attended any damn game. No interest in in any of it. As far as I'm concerned, Raymond Comets can go fuck themselves since they're revered above Jesu El Cristo in Raymond. And I remember when I was teaching Primary over 20 years ago, all the TVs were taken from the library and wheeled into the classrooms of the male kids and they were all tuned in to the Superbowl. So much for not watching TV on the Sabbath. They even shit on their own laws in their own buildings. LOL!

Raymond has always operated under it's own set of rules. Self righteousness is a given in that shithole. I can smell it when the wind blows from the south.

Raymond sprang, or more precisely, PLOPPED into existence when Raymond Knight's horse's anus opened up and dropped a pile of horse shit on the barren prairie ground. LOL! That wonderous event occured one block west of the Ridgeview Lodge.

Church basketball...brings to mind a cartoon. A bunch of downcast guys, some kind of church logo on their jerseys. One is saying, "I don't mind losing...but to the GAY church?"

Back in the day, church sports was a really big deal. My Dad was responsible for all church sports in Utah County. Serious. There were giant trophys. The basketball tournament was like the NCAA. The softball tournament was giant. A serious event.

I was paid to work the events. For years. Gawd I hated those men who played. Viscious, mean, egotistical, babies. I cannot tell you the number of fistfights I saw. Car windows broken. Rocks thrown. Names called...

The church is true, right?

That's awesome wish I could've been there I clashed with those leaders like you would not believe. They love their status and want to make sure everyone in town knows it. But the game gets so ridiculous when grown men are pushing over teenagers to get a rebound its just sad.

The worst I saw was a softball playoff. Dude hit a long ball to left center. Between the outfielders. Knows it going for the inside park home run. Rounds third. Looks back. Sees the fielders got it. Knows he should have stayed. To hell with it. He's going home. Ball got there just as he did. Catcher reaching to tag him. Ran through the catcher. I mean, hard. Broke the dude's shoulder, arm, leg and nose. For some reason, the catcher dropped the ball. Safe. Christianity at it's finest. 'See you at church tomorrow. Sorry about your face, but shit, we had to win.'

Church league. Softball. Fistfight. 'Thanks Geebus. We beat those other Geebus lovers who prayed to win, too. So, did you find my car keys? Gotta go tell mollymo I'm the stallion. Car keys, please...'

The church is so true...

Church b-ball was awful! The fights the cheap shots the language. It was if the court was a place that the oh so humble and weepy on Sunday could let out the pent up rage of the priesthood. It was always the guys in upper positions too.

I was the only boy scout in the branch attending at the stake center on Wednesday evenings and MANy moron boys took over the gym after meetings. The missionaries often would get their exercise there. Tournaments were the main church activity. The MAiN place lds boys learn bad behavior from bad lds men.

Many Wednesday weaknights the adults had meetings and children would occupy themselves by joining a game/ shooting balls or playing around/ checking out the opposite (or same) sex. The boys were obsessed with playing basketball and were so freaking insane about the game, while I didn't care much for it. I preferred any activity over balls in baskets, even making baskets.

The gym was remodeled way more than the chapel. That was obvious. Once they carpeted the gym end walls and floor, to make it quieter. A few years later it was removed to go back to a normal gym floor. The stake center is now in a newer building in a wealthier past of town. That whole building needs to be remodeled/ removed to make room for something useful.

God how I hated basketball. I was the late bloomer among my cohort. I began my senior year of high school at a strapping 5'2". I finally started growing that year. I shot up 7 inches in about 7 or 8 months to get to 5'9" and that's where I have been ever since.

It always bothered growing up that the only free time activity we ever seemed to have was basketball. It sucked that the only activity we had was something that I was so ill suited for.

But maybe it was all a metaphor for my involvement with the church as a whole. I never really fit in very well even though god knows I tried. It didn't really matter how hard I tried, I just wasn't ever going to fit the mold. Much like the awkward midget who was totally out of place on a basketball court.

I just wished I had learned much sooner in life to walk away from it all.

These are my experiences with church BB.

I had several ppi's from the EQP and the Bishopric to address my "incorrect" attitude about basketball. First, I was in trouble for not showing up to their games as a ward activity person. When I told them that I had little interest in the sport, they said, "Well then you can watch members play. You're setting a poor example." I was told to repent. Maybe I should have because I continued to have problems with bb while serving a mission.

Later as a mishie, I was at odds with various companions about getting up at 4AM to do laundry so the Zone could play basketball for 5-6 hours STRAIGHT. Of course, the MP took the side the of the players when he told me there was disharmony with my comp on P-days. He said, "Elder Goop, the sooner you learn to love the sport, the happier person you will become. Basketball is the sport of the CK. Haven't you noticed that the church builds a court in every church meetinghouse? You really disappoint me. I thought you were a bit brighter so we didn't have to have these kind of talks." He wasn't a bit phased that missionary rules were being broken to play hours of basketball. He was about to blame me as the agitator by opening up my file for baptisms that month (Mine was empty and he loved to shake it and wave it around then talk about how disappointed the Lord was!)

I continued to debate him and asked why football and soccer were strictly prohibited. "Now why would you want to play those dangerous games? Someone might get hurt. I want to promise you that if you petition the Lord with a broken heart and a contrite spirit in humility, then you will feel that what I say is the eternal truth. Now I will make a note here for our next monthly meeting. Remember Elder, you are wrong and must ask forgiveness for being too stubborn and selfish."

I foolishly blamed myself for not liking the sport. This was yet another cog in Mormonism that I failed to fit in.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/14/2017 11:56AM by messygoop.

Yes, basketball . . . the Mormon blood-letting ritual.