Play well, stave off critics

In 1987, I was paid to attend rehearsals and play in a community orchestra's Christmas concert.  The other bassist, a longtime orchestra member, said to me during one rehearsal, "You're a good bass player."  After rehearsal, his wife showed up to take him home.  He told her, "He's a good bass player.  I'd have told him if he wasn't."  I still wonder how he would have conveyed that, if I hadn't played well.  Would he have said, during a rest in "Joy To The World," for instance, "Say, you're a lousy bass player!  A pox upon you?"  He probably wouldn't have said that, but I'm still not entirely sure.