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Just wanted to say this about Dan and the +POS crew. Bought something from him a couple weeks ago and I wasn't completely satisfied with it. His willingness to make it right was appreciated and not only did he allow me to return it for other merchandise he shipped the new item that had had a MSRP higher for an even swap. No complaints here and I have no reservation of doing business with them again!

I can follow up the OP with the same result from +POS. I ordered a Cobra CP and was not happy with the the shoulder fit. Dan took it back customized the protector for my shoulders and sent it back free of charge. I would not hesitate or have any reservations to do business with +POS in the future. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Glad to see these posts. Hope things stay right with Dan and +POS. Great gear. Fair prices. Competition in this very narrow market is a good thing for all of us.

The big thing that I learned, in game management, when I started college ball was to let the coach ASK his question. These guys "know the rules" of arguing a call, so let them ask their question - stay quiet - answer their question and don't let them ramble and repeat. I have asked them if they have a question before, and they always rephrase what they have said. If it is judgment use "in my judgment" as part of your answer. They know they can't argue the judgment calls, but will try anyhow. An example - the last game I had, the batter got hit by a curveball on the pitch. "In my judgment" the batter attempted to get out of the way. The coaches argument was that he didn't move, and he said that this was a new rule this year. I still had my mask on, and asked - "so what is your question?" He asked if he made an attempt and I said yes - end of discussion, even though he was mumbling all the way back to the dugout. Game went on, nothing else came up about it. It ended up being a great game and we did 9 in 2:06. Keep your answers rule based, and don't let them get to you - sometimes they just try to get you rattled. Shut down the chirping, don't take anything from an assistant - just walk away. Have fun with the game and don't take things personally.

We have no state mandates, and we don't use stopwatches. That said, if I have the plate, I'm encouraging guys to hustle out if they're loafing, make sure there's someone warming F1 if F2 is delayed,etc. For the most part, at least at the Varsity level, I rarely need to move them along. If I count the 5 warmups after the second inning, The F2's usually get it and I don't have to count anymore..They're throwing down on pitch 4 or 5 on their own. they do good job around here of hustling in and out. I'm not sure if we're averaging a minute, but it's not usually an issue. OTOH.....Sub Varsity, and a "less diligent" PU and it can get unbearable. I end up standing in RF clapping my hands "Let's go, let's go" (directed mostly at my PU, who's either chatting with a coach, or otherwise oblivious to the fact that F1 is on his 9th warmup pitch)

http://mediadownloads.mlb.com/mlbam/mp4/2017/04/06/1257736483/1491444958808/asset_2500K.mp4 Your browser does not support iframes.

From the picture, the runner has direct access to HP (runner's leg would touch HP before he got to the shin guard). No OBS. The criteria is- the fielder, without possession of the ball, hinders the runner or alters the play. Here I don't have F2 hindering or altering as there is direct access to the plate behind the F2's left knee. If F2 was more up the 3B line when receiving this throw, then I would have OBS more prominent in my mind as the play developed.

Previously I had worn a Honigs K1 and it had served me well. I had picked up the +POS when I felt the need for something more protective. The K1 was light and it fit good but always seemed to a little lacking. The K1 always felt like it fit on me, while the +POS fits around me....... I just like the way the +POS conforms to me. Big highlights are that it breathes well and protects well. My only upgrade is that I am looking to upgrade the harness this year, but that isn't because the +POS harness is bad, its just that there are so many new improved harnesses out there. I also have a WV Platinum that I wear for the big boys.......but I have worn the +POS for higher levels and its taken a few really good hits without any notice.......

Following up with what @KenBAZ already disclosed, the level and... for lack of a better term... "intensity" of play is a significant factor in this. When you've got two above-average teams squaring off, with coaches who "know the drill" and have pitchers and catchers who have experience, often in not only HS games but also in (timed) tournament and showcase games, this concern about time between innings becomes a moot point. Often, these pitchers are already fully warmed up (typically in an actual bullpen) and don't want to give the opposition much in the way of "timing him up". So too, the larger and more intense HS programs have at least one backup / off-day catcher sitting in gear (at least shin guards and a mask), ready to receive warm-up pitches between innings, or warm-up a potential relief pitcher in the bullpen. These programs delight me (as an umpire, and as a former catcher) because as the game progresses, there is no time wasted between innings. I've had pitchers come out, throw one, then tell their F2 to send it. Love it! I see noticeable loss of time in games wherein one (or both) teams lack an 11th or 12th player who could potentially warm up the pitcher between innings. I also see it with programs who have rather shaky grasps on fundamental baseball (pitcher overthrows catcher, catcher overthrows pitcher, infielders are overthrowing each other in the background). Another big waste of time is when a HC makes a pitching change amongst his fielded nine. There's the figuring out who goes where, then there's the switching of gloves, then the warmup pitches are "started cold", with a majority of them giving a cringe to either the umpire or the folks behind the backstop. To top it off, the HC then has to convey all the lineup changes he's making. Lineup changes are a major time-leech, especially in the 5th and 6th innings. All of this is compounded in Sub-Varsity baseball. Here, even the most dutiful of umpire considers being dragged slowly behind a salt truck across a road of broken glass as more tolerable than watching all the lackluster activity between innings, on the part of both teams, and trying to keep them to a 1-minute interval. For as punctual as you enforce them to be to that 1-minute interval, the Baseball gods will drop on you a 9-run second inning, wherein a ball doesn't leave the infield (except by overthrow), you've forgotten how to pronounce the word "Strike", and we're now on our third pitcher... ... who now has to swap his outfield glove for his pitcher's glove, and needs his 8 warmup heaves pitches.

I work in the Coachella Valley in California, so there isn't a whole lot of mud on our fields. Makes it easy to just rinse the dust off the plate shoes in my kitchen sink.

I have it, and I like it very much..........

I really like the New Balance shoes, both bases and plate.

The New Balance 950 V2 works for me. I find them very comfortable.

I'm sorry if you interpreted my response as snarky, that was not my intention. The comment was intertwined with the whole "balk warning" discussion. Yes, umpires should know the rules. Yes, coaches should be teaching proper pitching mechanics. Does it always happen? No, of course not. I have no issue with "balk warnings" if that's what leagues want to do. I understand what you are saying, my comment was not intended to demean anyone, but rather just a comment reagrding the whole "balk warning" discussion and how to deal with different situations that may arise with warnings. For the record, I spent 14 years at my local LL, 13 as a manager, 13 as a board member, and 5 consecutive years as league president before my youngest went to play HS baseball. Even though I call HS ball now, I'm still involved with LL on our district level as an umpire and trainer. I completely understand the plight of coaches and the struggles that can face not only volunteer coaches, but league administrators, too. However, I always tried to educate myself on coaching and umpiring as much as possible. That doesn't always work for everybody, but I alway felt it was my obligation and responsibility to do my best whether coaching or umpiring. Being a coach has made me a better umpire, and umpiring has made me a better coach. (Even though I retired from coaching a few years ago.) That's for the feedback. I always appreciate the civil banter we can have on this forum.

And I guess umpires should know the rules. I hate your response as much as you hate mine. For the record, I hate my response too. It's not appropriate, and it's far too simplistic when addressing a complex problem. At the youth levels especially you have coaches thrown in, volunteers, who MIGHT have a passing knowledge of baseball in general, but almost certainly have no experience in dealing with pitching, pitching mechanics, let alone the intricate balk rules. And these teams have a hard enough time coming up with any coach, let alone a pitching coach. When you hear a "coach" say "Just throw strikes Johnny" it's because that's about as much feedback he can intelligently provide. These guys need an assist from the umpires from time to time, and don't need the snark or disdain, any more than the umpires do. I can tell you from personal experience that if you want an inexperienced coach to be your best friend, help him understand what he needs to do. With the warning or without, the inexperienced coach is looking for a life preserver, and often times the only one they see is an umpire.

This happened during a game one of my fellow umpires was working. I was asked the question on whether this is a balk or not. Hopefully I can describe it well enough for you all to give me your thoughts. I wasn't there, so this is based on how it was described to me. NFHS: F1 starts in the stretch, leaning in to get his signs. Once he does, he begins to come set. During his motion to come set, his non pivot foot comes to a complete stop, but the F1 continued to bounce his hands (still together) up and down in front of his body from about navel to sternum. After a couple of bounces, he comes to a complete & discernible stop prior to delivering the pitch. A balk was called, because - I was told - the hand movement did not constitute one continuous motion. I was under the impression that as long as something was moving during the motion to come set then it was part of "one continuous motion." If he had paused completely at some point and then did the hand bounce, I can see the balk for a double set. But since the hands were moving from his initial move to come set, he was OK as long as he came to a complete stop prior to delivery. If there was no complete stop then you could get the no-stop balk. Is this a balk? I think there is a MLB pitcher who does something similar, but I can't think of his name. Thanks for the input.

That's what I thought as well. So unless there was something missing from how it was described to me, I couldn't get a balk out of it. I don't necessarily think it was OOO, i think it was called because it looked odd. Which we all know, just because it looks odd doesn't make it illegal. Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

No. Since bouncing is not a legal set (we'd balk it for no-stop), it must be continuous motion. Not merely OOO — which is generally overly technical — but actually wrong. Glad it wasn't you.

AIA, our association here in AZ does not require us to time it. We are trained to enforce the eight and five practice and to signal and notify the offense when there are two warm-ups​ left. We have the benefit of coaches and players with a lot if experience so it's seldom if ever a problem. I work closely with catchers encouraging them to beat their pitchers into the field and to always jog back from the mound after a visit. On occasion I will have to encourage the leadoff hitter to step in right away. One other thing, we work hard to keep kids in the box once they enter. Again, a HS Varsity player here like in many other warm weather areas, has played hundreds perhaps thousands of games and will have heard it all before so this part of my job is not difficult. Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

no problem, ...yeah, ...you'd have to search both I'd think because of the spelling

So you delay the game in order to not delay the game?

Agree. I might have posted this here before (it's mine):

It did not stick to the chest protector. Yadi willed it to happen. He is that good.

We have two guys in our LOCAL (non-High School) Association that does everything from 6u through Middle School. They've both umpired for far longer than I and the "better to best" umpires in our association. Our Association assignor put it this way, "They both suffer from the same disease ... they don't want the responsibility and accountability of calling HS ball, so they look at the level of ball they get assigned to (mostly 12u and Middle School) as "not warranting their best efforts." They won't take a pregame seriously, they will do everything in their power to limit the number of steps they take in the field, and they stand in A and do the one thing we press every official NOT to do ... be non-commital. My favorite partner was put with one of these guys the other day for a single MS game. After watching his antics in the first inning, he called him in and flat out said, "JOHN -- you need to hustle! I have to know how to read you when you're in A. Either go out hard or commit to coming in hard, and I'll do the opposite of what I see you do. When you look like $hit, I look like $hit, and we both look like $hit. This umpire - fake name John - went to the OTHER lazy umpire - fake name Don - and told him that fake name TOM got "all over me" last game trying to impress everyone with his precise NCAA mechanics. "He's just being a pri--." Then Don went to the Assignor to share this story - taking John's side. Our Assignor has known their reputations for years, and he's decided to try to keep them together as a pair, and not subject the rest of us to it. No one has the luxury anymore to fire umpires unless, for example, they show up drunk to a game. The pay is bad, the annoying fans/parents/coaches can drive you to drink, and less than 10% of the people ever stop you and wave with a "Great Job, Mr. Blue!" We're all sick puppies to sign up for the gig I suppose.

I don't believe in giving one team a warning — I believe in giving both teams a warning, or just letting it go. I'm not at all opposed to retaliation when I see something that looks intentional — AS LONG AS IT DOESN'T COME AT HIS HEAD. Then all bets are off. Many times after I've suspected intent, and the opposing team comes out, and there's some mouthing going on, I'll flat out tell the catcher without looking at him, "If you throw at his head, I'm getting you and the pitcher. Keep it down." I ALWAYS get a "Yes Sir." That's the way the game should be played. Let the players take care of it, then assuming nothing was thrown at the head, warn both benches. Then by rule, if you rule any further intent, the Heach Coach gets tossed with the pitcher. Here, it's a $250 fine and a 2-game suspension. It's never happened on my watch. Players don't want that on their Head Coach's record, so they tend to knock it off.

Well, <poop>.

As long as #20 hasn't been in the game in any other capacity, and hasn't been CR for F1, he can CR for F2. It doesn't have to be the same guy. What CAN'T happen is, the SAME CR can't run for F2, and then later run for F1.

The call is I'd like to inspect that ball to see what was on it. Other than that, I don't see a call to be made. The ball is live since it's not lodged in his uniform, unless there's some rule or case play to the contrary. And there probably is. I'm usually wrong about this stuff.

In HS games, we do not use a watch. Heck, most guys don't even count the warmups. We only whine about the length of games, we don't do anything about it.

Agree, we're on the same page, just a bit of a misunderstanding. It's all good and I enjoy reading your contributions to this site! Thanks for the discussion.

Let it go!

If they are not delaying the game, don't worry about it.

I think the key is that both the interpretation and case cited above include very important specific modifiers that limit their scope. The first very clearly says doing it "for the purpose of warming up as a pitcher" is prohibited....what sense would there be in making it that specific if merely tossing a ball for another purpose is generally prohibited? If not "for the purpose of warming up as a pitcher", then fine by me. Additionally, in the case, they talk about coach or bench personnel, specifically excluding players in the game. Taking these in context, players in the game can throw it around, as long as they don't delay the game (covered under other rules) or do it for the purpose of warming up as a pitcher, at least to me.

Your situation describes exactly why balk warnings are not a good idea. With balk warnings, you don't allow the runner to advance, letting the defense benefit from their mistake. A pitcher could puposely balk when a runner is stealing in order to negate the advance. Leagues should not have balk warnings. Coaches should be teaching proper pitching mechanics.

Congrats - and have fun with it. A few tips I learned when I started were - 1. listen to your partner 2. let the play unfold 3. the faster the game the slower the timing 4. always be where you are supposed to be - the coaches have a good idea where you need to be to make the call 5. Have good game management and don't have thin skin or rabbit ears.

Agree. That's not how I'd handle it. Since the "substitution" is not official, the coach can change it, regardless of where on the field the "sub" is. I have no problem saying, "#9 can't CR for F1, he already ran for F2." For me, allowing a substitution that I know is illegal is akin to putting the ball in play in basketball when I know a team has 6 players on the court. Sure, they screwed up, and if I did put the ball in play, they'd be responsible for the technical foul when we saw 6. But to call that foul instead of waiting (or even saying to a player, "hey, you've got 6 out here") is a "gotcha" call that I won't make (if I can help it). For me, the other team knowing isn't an issue. If the other coach asks, I'd say, "coach, they tried to run a player who can't legally run, so I disallowed the substitution. I'd extend you the same courtesy." If he's mad that he didn't get the cheapest of outs, so be it. (And I get that the expectations might be different at your level, and almost certainly they were in pro ball.) My philosophy of officiating amateur sports is to facilitate playing the game the right way. I'm not there just for the paycheck, nor to show off my rules knowledge (not about me), nor to get it done as fast as legally possible. Preventive officiating can look a lot like coaching or "helping" a team: maybe the difference is that (good) coaching gives a team an advantage, where preventive officiating prevents a team from putting themselves at a disadvantage. [I just made that up, so it's probably at best partly right.] The other axiom I'd propose is: the proper extent of "preventive officiating" is inversely proportional to the level of the game. Pro ball has none; 9U should have as much as possible.

As wrong as some may think this is, I do all I can to prevent an illegal substitute from entering the game. If I notice that the CR would not be legal, I don't accept the CR as he is not official until accepted. This happens to me 4-5 times a year and I have never had a defensive coach balk at it. On another note, if the CR does slip by, he may not necessarily be an illegal substitute as he could be considered a pinch runner for all intents and purposes. Side question: is it possible for CRs to be unnanounced?

Go ahead and take mine personally. You have some major balls asking $150 for a set of freaking mask pads, and for coming on here and even thinking that any one of us is dumb enough to send you hundreds of dollars without the security of an ebay auction for some navy blue jock sniffer regalia. Don't wait until May. And I second what Boy-in-R said so cleverly.

Sorry if I came off disrespectful. It was my way of making fun of people that buy this stuff not you. I hope you get TOP dollar for your stuff just like I got for mine. I just think that it's funny that people pay so much. I am also guilty of paying to much. I laugh at myself for paying $200 for the new Douglas when I have a perfectly fine Gold. Again I apologize and don't take my comment personally.