sasmallen

You should be able to find just about anything using google in the same amount of time that it takes to make a post here. I just don't buy the "busy at work excuse". I'm sure we are all busy, but most of us make sure we know the rules, and if something like the op comes up, you can be sure that I'm looking it up as soon as I get to the car, or home.

Well the host team from Houston, Kyle Chapman PONY beat Team Miami 6-4 Monday night to earn a trip to the PONY 13 World Series. Pretty good weekend, good baseball with one exception. I did have to toss a pitcher and manager in one of my games Saturday, but that's a story for another thread. For whatever it's worth the PONY director over the South Zone asked if he could make arrangements for us to call the 2010 (or 2011 if '10 is already filled) PONY World Series in Pennsylvania (I'm not going to hold my breath, but we'll see). He said the paperwork needed to be filled out after the first of the year, and that they pay $20 per game plus a per diem. Anybody know how much that per diem is? Just wondering how much money we would have to raise for 4 of us to go up there.

Not LL, but I'm calling the PONY 13 South Zone Tournament here in Houston this weekend. South Zone stretches from Texas all the way to Florida, just includes the states on the coast. The winner goes to the PONY 13 World Series in California. We're doing 3-man until the final night, then it will be 4-man. Going in I thought the Miami team would be the clear favorite, but after last night (Miami lost) it looks like a team from west central Texas is pretty strong. I had two games last night, I'll have the two late games today, three on Sunday, and at least one on Monday night (championship, which could be 2 games Monday night if the team out of the losers bracket wins the first game).

Our young guys beg to get scheduled for that league's pinto instead of others that we have because the pay is so high. The other leagues that we do pinto for pay about $25-$30, so that's more in line with what you guys get. Like I said, we quoted high fees thinking they would go with another association because they are located about 20 miles away from our umpire nearest to them, and the most direct route is a toll road. We did have a guy that's been a umpire for over 25 years decide to sell his plate gear and do nothing but pinto. Worked out ok because he's able to train the new guys that are partnered up with him (how to handle coaches, game management, etc). By the way, the time limit for those pinto games is 1:15 If I was smart that's where I would have been every weekend this season (nobody ever accused me of being smart).

Yea, we've been working together a lot since he joined our association. That's why the reporter asked me what the deal was because I had worked the game with him. The South Zone PONY 13 Tournament (winner goes to the World Series) will be held this weekend in the Houston area and myself, Ben, and another umpire will be the crew for the opening night...The Director has already asked if Ben can throw out the first pitch . I'll guess that will be another thing I can add to my umpire list of firsts, right below partner signs autographs after a game. The funny thing is the league that's hosting the tournament has Craig Biggio's son playing for their 14 y/o team and he goes to all of his son's games. I told Ben that Biggio would be a much better choice . He agreed with me.

Our association has a simple rule...if you want our umpires, you must pay for at least 2 per game, age of the players makes no difference. Like I said, some leagues turn us down and go to other associations, but many end up coming back to us willing to accept our terms after seeing what they get with the other guys. This makes it easy to keep getting good young umpires, they know they'll always have a partner no matter what level they call. If I had to call a machine pitch game for whatever reason and had the choice of a partner or going one-man...I'd take a partner. This past spring we had to turn down 3 leagues because we didn't have enough umpires to cover them in addition to our other contracted leagues...one of them (located about 30 miles from our base area), we tried to turn down by giving them a inflated (for our area) bid for services ($55 for PONY, $45 for Bronco, and $40 for Mustang and Pinto per umpire, per game) but they still wanted a contract with us.

I felt bad for him because there was nothing he could do. There was no way he could just tell the kids no and keep walking...that would've really caused a stink. http://www.hcnonline.com/articles/2009/07/22/pasadena_citizen/sports/071909_angels.txt I don't even know how the kids knew who he was. The newspaper guy saw it and asked me what was going on, after I told him Ben's former job he decided he might have a good story.

So are you saying if a league wanted 2-man crews for those levels your association wouldn't happily provide 2 umpires per game? Overkill or not, having more umpires on the field is rarely a bad thing...guys that have never umpired before are able to learn with umpires that have 1 or 2 years experience. We find it works very well, and the league is happy as well. If a league wants just one umpire they can go to one of the other area associations and get one (usually) poorly trained umpire. Some have even done this...most come back the very next season ready to pay us for two officials.

Wow, our new umpires are able to start out on machine pitch, t-ball, and 8 y/o kid pitch with 2-man crews. We don't do any games with just one umpire, if the league won't pay for two we won't enter into a contract with them.

Getting a 1099 means that the income has been reported to the IRS. It's common (although against the tax code) to only report the officiating income that's listed on 1099 form(s), and not report any undocumented cash income (lots of local PONY leagues around here just pay cash at the end of the night, and don't even ask for your SS#). I'll plead the 5th when it comes to whether or not I report ALL of the income I make from umpiring. :)

You don't want to know the other titles I came up with that didn't make the cut. By the way, one colt and one palomino game tonight and the under shorts are still comfortable!

With this one the cup does not move for me at all. I would be very surprised if you had that problem with this model. The cup pouch has padding sewed in around it that seems to keep it comfortably up against my body.

I've tried many types of "under shorts" during my umpire career. Comfort has obviously been a major concern but I've also received my share of foul balls off my inside thighs (maybe only one or two a year, but the bruise stays there for weeks). My old standby was a pair of under armour compression shorts with the cup pocket. They were comfortable enough, but provided zero protection against those rare inner thigh shots. A year or two ago I heard about the McDavid hexpad umpire shorts from another ump, and picked me up a pair. I found them to be a little bulky but not too bad behind the plate. The biggest problem I had with them was when I had a doubleheader...wearing them under my base pants made me feel like I was wearing a football girdle on the bases. I know I could change shorts along with my pants in between games, but I guess I'm a little too lazy for that so the McDavid's were stuffed in the back of the drawer and I went back to the under armour shorts. The week before last I noticed a rip in the inner lining of the UA's so I went online to order me another pair. As luck would have it I tumbled across a pair of catchers shorts that are the same brand as my cup (shock doctor). They looked very comfortable and even had a little padding that could help to soften some "blows". They were pricey, but with all of the games I've worked this year, I've made enough $ to take a chance on them. http://www.baseballexp.com/Baseball-Apparel/Adult-Compression-Sliding-Shorts/Shock-Doctor-Mens-Catchers-Sliding-Shorts From the first moment I put them on I was in love! These things are the most comfortable things I've ever worn under my pants, and you can't even tell you're wearing a cup when you put it in the padded pocket. Thankfully I have not had occasion to test the small padding on the thighs, but a little is better than nothing. The comfort factor is a really big deal as I am starting a busy time right now with PONY 13 and Colt Region Tournaments, PONY Section(s), plus PONY 13 and Palomino Zone Tournaments all taking place over the next 3 weeks. When you add the 100+ degree heat to all of those games, being comfortable "down there" is very important. If anybody else has been wearing these shorts for any period of time, I'd like some feedback on how well they have been holding up. For the price I would expect them to last at least 2-3 years, but you never know.

I have both types of shirts, majestic from this year and honig's shirts from 2008, 07, 06, and 05. I can say without any doubt at all that they are not the same shirt with a different label. The only thing they have in common is the colors...the material is very different for the shirt and the collar. I'm one of the few people in my association that likes the majestic...just wish there were more available as I only have a couple of the MLB blue. The only thing I don't like about the majestic is the small logo on the right sleeve, though it's not that big of a problem.

I found this post on "Gerry Davis or Diamond 3xi" interesting and have nominated it accordingly for "Post Of The Month July, 2009"