Mr. "forget the girls, its all about me" Umpire.

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Bret,

I would first like to point out and say, Nice picture! I wonder who the pitcher is in the left side of the picture? I would guess, that would be me!

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I have ran into a lot of bad umpires as a coach and a player, as a pitcher to be exact in the men's fastpitch game. For example, Bret would know who I am talking about, my Thursday night team had this one umpire, a total joke I may add, that was in such a hurry he started making up his own rules, not even regarding the league rules themselves. He had the nerve to yell at me while I was warming up between innings that I had a warning, because ASA rules state, "Only one pitch between innings are to be thrown as warm ups." and after that I knew this guy was a joke. The man saw me at a later girls tournament I was at, and admitted he missed some calls in the last inning, which was the 8th!! As I walked the winning run in because he "missed" some calls. Ugh!

 

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Bret, we have the same picture btw!!! haha

 

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Had him last year and this year at Gapss ... we were playing the wolfpack and he gave us all the speech before the game ...he said, well you are 12u so cheering isn't such a big thing, I told him 'heck I would love for my girls to cheer more, we tend to be too much about our business... "

So we start and the wolfpack kids are all behind the backstop fence which is 8 feet from home plate at Coffey .. they are cheering away and just as our pitcher starts her motion - they stop like he asked - crickets, dead silence ... I was cracking up .. the sudden silence after all the cheering was more noticable...

does not make any sense ... deal with the problem situations - dont ruin it for all.. a simple speech about proper cheering would be enough...

 

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@Bretman. Normally I agree with you a 100% but you are off base here. His actions have nothing to do with the rules or upholding sportsmanship. You can PM me and I will give you the guys real first name but for 2 years my team has called him ROCKSTAR!!! When he does a game he wants everyone to know he is in charge. i have had him on my games or watched him work over 50 games in the last 3 years and in nearly 40% of those games he has ejected a coach or fan.

To make matters worse he knows less than most of my 11u parents about the ASA rule book and his strike zone not only changes inning to inning or even batter to batter but pitch to pitch.

Half of the time his ejections are because he is so freaking arrogant that when he is presented with the actual rule (by showing him the rule book) he is offended a person so below him (aka coach) would dare qustion his infinent knowledge.

He was going to throw me out of my own tournament Saturday because I drew a line with my foot to show my catcher caught a ball and slid inside the out of play line. His exact words were "coach if you EVER draw a line on MY field again I will toss your butt"
After the game I went up to him and whispered in his ear "this game is not about you it is about the girls" and I could still hear him chirping as I walked with my team.

If anyone knows the Sienfeld episode with the soup nazi. This guy is "no good calls for you"

 

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Bret, we have the same picture btw!!! haha

Yep! Except I cropped you out and blew myself up. That must mean that I'm "all about me"!

 

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@Bretman. Normally I agree with you a 100% but you are off base here. His actions have nothing to do with the rules or upholding sportsmanship...

I guess I'll take your word for it, since you were there and I wasn't. Though I am kind of wondering how anyone would know what is going on in somebody else's mind or what their intentions might be.

But I know what you guys mean about having "one of those" umpires. It can make for a long afternoon at the old ballpark! Some guys just don't get it. They force their own opinions and interpretations on the teams, maybe thinking that is the way to command their respect. All they are really doing is losing the respect of the players and coaches and creating more problems for themselves than they think they are solving.

Rules and mechanics and game management can be taught and learned. "Personality"...that's a hard one to fix. I really think that some guys just don't have the right demeanor to effectively handle people or tough situations.

Myself, all I can do is try my best not to be "that guy".

 

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I think I know who you are talking about , if so he has been told time and again about this. We are aware and are on top of this.His evaluation will reflect his demeanor and attitude towards his advancement to the older flights. He is at the 12u level now and may be working he way out to rec ball or even slow-pitch. Young umpires have to start some where and if they just don't GET it they will be weeded out.
Dan Adkins
past president COSUA

 

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Trust me this umpire wants everyone to know he is in charge! Watched him throw out the other teams coach, because the coach spoke while he was speaking! Didn't yell, just was asking a question in a low voice. I was about 15 feet away & had to listen careful to here coach. The cheering thing is just no good! I like the silence, but it does take away the fun for 10u teams. What ends up happening is that nobody cheers at all so you don't break his rules. By the way my DD teams are something like 6 - 1 with him as ump. Wish he would keep his mind on making good calls, & less on making sure everyone knows he is in charge.

Here is the call the coach was discussing/questioning.

1st baseman obstructed our runner as she rounded 1st. I seen the fist go out so I sent her to 2nd & she was out by 5 feet. He said she was to stay at 2nd & did not need to return to 1st. He said if not for the obstruction she would have had a stand up double. If not for the obstruction I would not have even sent her to 2nd! Just 1 example of the bad calls this guy hands out on a regular basis. Could type all night long, but its time to hit the sack!

 

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Here is the call the coach was discussing/questioning.

1st baseman obstructed our runner as she rounded 1st. I seen the fist go out so I sent her to 2nd & she was out by 5 feet. He said she was to stay at 2nd & did not need to return to 1st. He said if not for the obstruction she would have had a stand up double. If not for the obstruction I would not have even sent her to 2nd! Just 1 example of the bad calls this guy hands out on a regular basis. Could type all night long, but its time to hit the sack!

Bad call? I don't know...

Out by five feet? That's little more than a single stride when running full speed. Pretty easy to imagine that an obstructed runner could have lost between a step and a step-and-a-half when she was obstructed.

Not saying that you haven't seen this umpire make bad calls before. Just saying that this one doesn't seem to be all that big of a stretch. Besides, the defense is the one that screwed up here. If the runner only got thrown out by a step-and-a-half, I might tend to give the benefit of the doubt to the offense.

 

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I let each coach know at the beginning of the game, no cheering toward the opposing pitcher, no screaming either. Some of the noise in the dugouts is very annoying! The idea is to keep it positive and motivational, while we all know there are some out there that use it as distraction and not as a motivation. So as we slam an umpire, that obviously had a pithcher for a dd, he knows what should be allowed via ASA guidelines and what shouldn't be. If you cant cheeer porperly and positive then you shouldn't be cheering at all, if what he is doing is hindering your play, then you've been doing it wrong the entire time!!! JMO