Ejection!!

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I believe for the sake of argument that we may not have all the info on this incident. I'm not an umpire but I believe it's obvious that only half of the violation was handled correctly.

To my knowledge, Bretman is correct that the responsible parties here is the coach and offending player the ruling would mean a restriction to the dugout for the remainder of the game if it were the second time ANY girl was caught with jewelry after the game starts. The first offense would be the removal and a team warning. You see, it could have been another girl that was issued the first warning and removal but the second offense brings on a stiffer penalty.

I understand Bretman's concern that a rogue player decides on her own to put her favorite bracelet back on after being told to remove it, yet the coach eventually gets restricted to the bench. While it seems unfair to the coach, they are still pilot in command of their ship and are responsible for their players throughout the game. One scenario we haven't discussed is the possibility the player talked back to the umpire or used foul language and was actually ejected from the game because of the way they responded to the ruling. There may be more to the story.

The girls that upset me are the ones that wait till March to get a piercing, then claim they need to leave it in all the time or the hole will heal shut. Why would a kid do this if indeed they wanted to play softball? I have no mercy for a player with that mentality.

 

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I agree that all rules need to be followed , not trying to bend the rule , I even think it's a good rule . You give young girls an inch of leeway with jewerly and it would be a disaster. Assuming this went down like the OP said it did the ump in question is really out of line. He knows the rule well enough to apply it to the 9th degree but doesn't know the correct penality ?? And he errors on the side of tossing a player out of a game ? I'll never believe he did'nt go into that contest looking to throw a player out, and for that hr/she needs red flagged. MD

 

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Good point raised earlier that perhaps this player was "restricted to the bench", not "ejected". They are two completely different things which might look exactly the same to the casual observer.

I run into a lot of umpires that think the pre-game plate conference statement about players being "properly equipped" serves as an "official warning". That simply isn't the case in high school softball. The "official warning" only comes if the rule is broken during the game.

So...IF the player was actually restricted to the bench, not ejected, this umpire's only mistake was that he restricted her on the first offense, not on the second offense as the rule requires.

A mistake, nevertheless, but not nearly as glaring as this was first made out to be. Here again, I would encourage the team's coach or A.D. to contact the person who assigns their umpires to discuss this call. If you do that, the official may learn something and not blow this call again.

 

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Bretman, fair enough on the ego statement...I jumped the gun without facts....

Let me ask a question though. If this was a select tourney during summer ball, would the ump be so quick to eject a player? How would that go for the TD?

 

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I'm surprised also , surprised anyone would take up for blue in this one, he cost a player an entire game on his/her mistake , could have cost this team a won/loss, a conference title , who knows. It's a severe screw up IMO , player and the coach might have erred also but it's blue responsibility to get the penality right. MD

 

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I believe for the sake of argument that we may not have all the info on this incident. I'm not an umpire but I believe it's obvious that only half of the violation was handled correctly.

To my knowledge, Bretman is correct that the responsible parties here is the coach and offending player the ruling would mean a restriction to the dugout for the remainder of the game if it were the second time ANY girl was caught with jewelry after the game starts. The first offense would be the removal and a team warning. You see, it could have been another girl that was issued the first warning and removal but the second offense brings on a stiffer penalty.

I understand Bretman's concern that a rogue player decides on her own to put her favorite bracelet back on after being told to remove it, yet the coach eventually gets restricted to the bench. While it seems unfair to the coach, they are still pilot in command of their ship and are responsible for their players throughout the game. One scenario we haven't discussed is the possibility the player talked back to the umpire or used foul language and was actually ejected from the game because of the way they responded to the ruling. There may be more to the story.

The girls that upset me are the ones that wait till March to get a piercing, then claim they need to leave it in all the time or the hole will heal shut. Why would a kid do this if indeed they wanted to play softball? I have no mercy for a player with that mentality.

Good point. We always schedule all piercings for the second week in August. For tenni$, mid October. Although, I don't recall any such restrictions/rules for tenni$. Can't help it. One dd plays softball because of the other dd who plays tenni$. Long story.

 

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not attempting to be argumentative but why is the mistake not as glaring as originally thought , am I missing some correction/addt' info about what happened ? girl had on a rubber band or bracelet , got tossed or removed because blue did'nt know that a warning was supposed to given , therefore costing her a whole game (it was her 1st AB right ?)

 

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She was ejected for wearing one of these???

I completely agree with MD, the ump is an a$$. I believe the idea behind not wearing the jewelry is to prevent injury. What possible injury could one of these cause? Heck, if she was wearing several of them, she could make the argument that they were actually protecting her wrist.

What a jerk. (sorry I couldn't answer your original question, though)

What possible injury you ask??? Think about it. It's on her wrist. She's making a play at a base. A kid slides in head/hands first. A finger slides up under the band and gets dislocated or broken. This kid breaks a rule and someone else suffers the consequences. That's one example of a possible injury. It's a ball game - not a fashion show. The player needs to think more about the team and less about herself. Take the band off and play ball.

 

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I'm with you , NOT against you on the rule , NO JEWERLY PERIOD , my gripe is with blue who knows this rule so well he couldn't wait to enforce it ---right up to the point he cost a player a game and could have directly influenced the outcome of the game by his ignorance of the proper penality. MD

 

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not attempting to be argumentative but why is the mistake not as glaring as originally thought , am I missing some correction/addt' info about what happened ? girl had on a rubber band or bracelet , got tossed or removed because blue did'nt know that a warning was supposed to given , therefore costing her a whole game (it was her 1st AB right ?)

I am not trying to be argumentative either, but the fact is we don't have all the facts in this case. We can't just drag blue to the gallows or paint any big red letters on him without knowing what exactly transpired that's all.

 

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one thing to miss a bang bang play , or maybe the obstruction/inference ruling, or some other rare ruling or bizarre instance that pops up . But to throw a kid out of the game over a rubber band ? I'm not cutting the ump any slack on that. He could have cost this team a win. just not right. MD

 

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The player alone chose to break the rule. Was the umpire incorrect? Perhaps, perhaps not. Not many on this thread were apparently there and know what actually happened. We don't have the whole story. Perhaps it is exactly as the starter of the thread stated. Perhaps the umpire told her to take it off and she called him a stupid MF'er. The fact remains that responsibility starts with the player. If players don't break rules then they don't allow officials the opportunity to misapply penalties.

 

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"One scenario we haven't discussed is the possibility the player talked back to the umpire or used foul language and was actually ejected from the game because of the way they responded to the ruling. There may be more to the story."

I have to agree with Daboss.There has to more to the story.

 

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I am not trying to be argumentative either, but the fact is we don't have all the facts in this case. We can't just drag blue to the gallows or paint any big red letters on him without knowing what exactly transpired that's all.

ASSUMING (ha ha) that it happened just like the OP said, she comes to bat , has a rubber band on , time called , kid tossed or removed , no warning. The kid got publically humilated , but we can't say who the blue was that caused the mess by screwing the situation up ? costing a player an entire game is a huge deal to me .

 

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OK - I say HS ball institutes a "red flag protest" like the NFL. Create a list of infractions that would apply to the new protest rule - jewelry being one of them. If the umpire makes a ruling on one of the listed items, the coach has an opportunity to "throw down the red protest flag". After the game, if the umpire is proven to be wrong in applying the penalty (by actually READING the rulebook), the umpire must sit out TWICE the number of games the player was wrongly penalized for. For umpires that are confident in their calls, this would be no problem. NOW THE TWIST: If, after the protest, the umpire's ruling was in fact correct, the COACH must sit out twice the number of games! Call it the "Goose and Gander" rule.

 

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Coach Dennis - could you shed some more light on this ordeal --Did the girl say something ? or was it just as cut/dry as you stated ?

 

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not attempting to be argumentative but why is the mistake not as glaring as originally thought?

I did acknowledge that this was still a mistake and that the umpire's supervisor should be made aware of it. If you consider that "defending" the umpire, well...

I said "not as bad as first thought" because:

- Several posts were raking the guy over the coals because he considered a rubber bracelet as "jewelry", which is actually correct.

- IF....and I did say IF...the player was restricted instead of ejected, she would not be suspended from the next two games. I'd consider missing one game better than three!

Just for the record....I hope that no umpire EVER makes a mistake in a game!

 

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ASSUMING (ha ha) that it happened just like the OP said, she comes to bat , has a rubber band on , time called , kid tossed or removed , no warning. The kid got publically humilated , but we can't say who the blue was that caused the mess by screwing the situation up ? costing a player an entire game is a huge deal to me .

MD you are right. If this player did not say a word or rolled her eyes or anything like that to show the umpire up in front of the other players on the field, then he should have only warned before pulling the trigger.

However, if she did say something or showed any signs of disrespect after the ump tried talking to her then he was probably warranted in what he did. We just don't know for sure.

 

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That's just a completely mishandled situation. Since we don't know all the facts and are just guessing, how about this?

The ump in question is one of this people with an authority complex and thus after he told the teams to remove "jewelry" the girl had the band on, he took it as a challenge to his personal "manhood" and ejected her.

When LeBron wore a headband, is this "jewelry"? I wouldn't have thought of a rubber band with a message to fight breast cancer as "jewelry", I would assume it meant something made of a precious metal and with some kind of gemstone. Something that could do real damage, tear skin. Okay, so I'm wrong according to the definition of The Rules, so give the appropriate warning and let's play high school softball.

You'll never convince me that it was just someone with an authority complex who wanted to show off their knowledge of the rules when in fact they demonstrated their ignorance of them.

So - are umps asking teenage girls to raise their shirts to see if they have belly button piercings, or others? How do they see that or prove that? Let's get airport scanners at all ballfields, DD might sneak in a belly-button ring. Where do we draw the line for Common Sense verses "Let's Legislate Everything to the Nth Degree"?

And can we safety assume that everyone on this thread, other threads, and other forums who get high and mightly quoting the verbatim rule book all drive exactly 55 MPH to tournaments, keep accurate records to the penny when they claim "charitable" deductions on their 1040 form, and never, ever told their boss they were leaving work early for an eye doctor appointment that just happened to be next to the softball field where DD was playing?

Rules should be enforced. The proper way. If you're not cognizant enough to enforce it the proper way, then what confidence is there that you understand all of the rules?

 

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Personally, I don't think the ump was out of line for enforcing the rule.

Coach should know the rules. Senior player should know the rule too. Maybe I am wrong but I believe it was stated that the ump reminded the coach of the rule before the game started.

DD has played in many HS and summer games where the coach is told by the ump before the game starts that all jewelry needs to be removed. That is the warning. Any one still wearing jewerly after being warned is subject to enforcement of the rule. I've seen it enforced in both travel and HS games.

Could the ump have chosen to cut some slack / bend the rules, sure.... but he chose not to and enforced the rule.